


A Thousand Graves

by Stormfoedt



Category: Fairy Tail
Genre: F/M, OOC
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-11
Updated: 2016-05-11
Packaged: 2018-06-07 18:00:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 26
Words: 70,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6818401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stormfoedt/pseuds/Stormfoedt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She is Lucy C.H., associate of Ur and Igneel and grown in the Northern Lands out of Fiore. Adventures and secrets lay behind her, and Fairy Tail in the present and future. What is she, what knows she and what will become of her?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Have you ever had a Cat?

If you ever had a cat, you might've experienced it bringing home dead animals. You know, dead mice, birds, sometimes fish. I had a cat named Odin. Don't ask me why, it just fit him, somehow. He was very proud, only had one eye, and frequently brought home dead animals. Fish was alright, he ate those, but the birds and mice he always left for me.

I always made little graves for them, with headstones and everything made from pebbles. Mama always found this a rather odd habit, but let me do my thing, since it simply was my way of handling death. You know, get them into the ground, stand in front of the final resting place in silence for a moment, and you're done. I never blamed Odin for hunting or anything. It was his nature, a natural trait from being a carnivore. Heck, I ate meat myself every day.

Still, the dead should be honoured, awarded with slight recognition for their existence. Over the years I got a miniature graveyard on my hands, sorted neatly within a compound complete with a small fence around it. Every now and then I would light a candle for them.

Then the day came when Odin died, thus joining his prey in my little sacred place. I cried, which was understandable since I actually knew him when he was alive. It was alright though, since I already had come to terms with the fact that everything dies eventually. That was what I believed in any case. That was before my world was shattered into tiny, unrecognisable bits.

My village died. It was a small village, but filled with old people, children, adults, animals. You know, things villages usually have. I buried all of them, a thousand graves or more, each with their own little candle showing them the way to the afterlife. I didn't cry though.

How can you cry when there is no longer anyone to comfort you? I also buried the monster that did it. No discrimination. His light was the biggest of all, since he would need the extra light to get to wherever he was headed. After all, when having killed so many human beings while laughing, it had to be shrouded in darkness.

That was my world. Waiting for things to die, so I could show it respect. I stopped respecting life itself after that incident. How can something that hurts you so much deserve respect? Why didn't I die, when everyone else did? I had nowhere to go, unless...

The thought struck me as I sat on a large rock staring at my small graveyard, the one where Odin lay resting, and I saw the headstone next to his with a name of a person I never met. There was that crazy lady. A crazy lady with short, black hair as dark as her eyes, though she harboured warmth in their depths. She should be alive still. She was STRONG. I got up, sent one last look at my wrecked life, the village that no longer held anything. Yes. Ur would be alive still. Or so I thought...


	2. Magnolia

I watched the moving landscape outside the window of the carriage I was sitting in. I was on a train, headed for the one place I had ever heard of apart from the village. Me and Mama had lived alone in the forest. We only had each other, and the nearby village that we went to every now and then to buy supplies. I knew little of the people there, could recite a few names at best. Really, I am bad at names.

This is the country Fiore, a country famous for its many mages, and the guilds where said mages usually are employed. Right now this train was headed for Magnolia, a town with one single guild. Fairy Tail it was called. What I would do when I got there I didn't know, but... it was the only thing I had been able to think of when I heard Ur was no more, leaving behind a legacy.

I smiled, and focused my gaze on my reflection in the window. I had long, blond hair fixed in a loose side ponytail to be out of the way. My eyes were brown, rather big, and I was pale. I blamed the scarce sun up north for that. Currently I wore a pair of denim shorts, a bit ripped at the edges since they originally were pants.

My torso was adorned with a loose, black t-shirt. I would like to call me busty, Mama always said that I would topple over if they grew any bigger unless my ass grew accordingly to regain some kind of balance. I would pout at that, and then she would laugh. Mama always found my pouting face amusing.

"We will be arriving at Magnolia Station shortly. All passengers getting off are asked to gather their belongings and head for the nearest exit. I frowned a bit, and then got up, my bag in my hand as I slowly moved through the wagon towards the back entrance.

"Natsu... we're here, Natsu. We have to get off, or we're gonna take the train AGAIN," I gazed sideways, and saw a blue cat nudging something that somewhat resembled a human being. I chuckled at the pathetic look the boy had plastered on his badly bloated face as he tried not puking his guts out.

"Poor thing..." I mumbled to myself before smiling broadly.

"Yo. Cat, need any help with that?" I pointed at the boy. The cat turned around slowly, giving me a long stare.

"Excuse me Miss, but you have to get off. The train is about to depart," the conductor looked at me, completely avoiding the THING laying on the seat.

"Sorry, Sir. I'll just gather this.." I lifted the boy by the collar and tossed him with backpack and everything over my shoulder.

"That should be all. I'm off," I smiled at the partly shocked, partly relieved man, and then stepped onto the platform moments before the train departed.

"Now, boy. A little motion sick, are we?" I put the boy down and he fell to the ground, clearly not recovered yet. The cat came flying soon after, started to poke the poor guy to check if he was still alive.

"Thank you, lady, we have been riding that train for a long time now," the cat said. I simply nodded and stared at the poor thing. My smile was momentarily gone. It hurts to smile, you know, remembering their faces. The ones that had faces, that is.

"By the look of the conductor, I figured as much. I do hope this was the place you were supposed to get off at though. Yo, you alive or what," I squatted down, poked the guy lightly. As if electrocuted, he suddenly stood up, pumping his fist in the air. He was rather strange looking, with pink hair, an open vest without anything under it, wearing some loosely fitted white pants and with a scaled scarf around his neck. His backpack held a sleeping bag, probably a change of clothes, not much more could fit in it. Some food, perhaps.

"Hah! I'm alive and kickin'!" he said proudly. I got up. Wow, quick recovery, huh...

"Glad to hear. Now, as thanks for saving your pitiful self from good ol' locomotive over there, do you have any idea as to where Fairy Tail is?" he made a barfing sound at the mention of locomotive, but lit up as I said the name of the guild.

"'Course! It's right up ahead!" he said, while pointing then started walking in the same direction.

"Aye sir!" the cat exclaimed and flew after him. I sighed but went after them.

The guild was right up ahead, indeed. Literally, in fact. It made it fairly easy to find it. The boy - hadn't the cat called him Natsu? - went ahead with large strides, and I had difficulties following the guy. As we neared the guild, I felt a certain dread growing in the pit of my stomach. What mess had I gotten myself into by coming here?

"I'm home!" the boy exclaimed as he kicked the door to a large building open. Above the door FAIRY TAIL was spelled out with large and colourful letters. It looked like a bar inside. People sat drinking and chatting everywhere while being served food and beverage by a woman with long, white wavy hair. She had big, blue eyes, fair skin and a motherly smile. The kind I often saw older women have when staring at the little ones playing.

Mama would have that sometimes too, though the wolfy grin was her usual attire. A feral grimace full with humour and mischief while her eyes sparkled. Might as well make use of this beer hall and get myself something refreshing. I walked over at the bar, ignoring a starting brawl behind me and waited for the barmaid to return.

"Ah, you came with Natsu! Such a beauty too! Do you wish to join the guild, perhaps?" The barmaid was there unexpectedly, and had noticed that Natsu and I had entered at the same time.

"Nah, just picked up some dead meat as I got off the train. Joining the guild, however... is it any fun?" I stared questionably at her, tilting my head. She had chuckled knowingly at my first remark, and now nodded.

"Always," she said.

"What kind of requirements are there, though? I come from up north, and they don't really have any guilds up there..."

"You're from the North? Thats unusual. Gray! Come'ere!" she shouted, and stared at me apologetically before leaving me in order to serve some costumers. I sat there slightly confused until a slightly battered up boy with black hair and only wearing his underwear came up and sat next to me, staring after the beautiful barmaid. I looked at him for a moment, and then proceeded to laugh loudly.

"Oh my gosh! You must be Gray, am I correct? You have to be HERS!" I laughed loudly and he looked at me, slightly flabbergasted before looking down, swearing and going off to find his clothes. I felt tears prickling from my eyes as I started coughing a bit.

"Hey, what's so funny?" Natsu asked, and I pointed at the stripper as he was putting on his newly reacquired pants.

"Ow. damn. hehe... it hurts but damnit.. can't.. hehehe, stop laughing *cough*" I stopped talking as I started coughing and fell to the ground, gasping for air.

"What, Gray?" he asked as I lay on my back, smiling.

"YO! Gray, you are hers, aren't you? That crazy lady from the North.. Ur, right?" I saw Gray stiffen and turn to glare at me. It was not a nice glare. I sat up, wiping blood off my mouth while smiling. All of a sudden he was over me, punched in the face so hard that I flew backwards and crashed into a table.

"That was uncalled for, but I guess it's true then.." I said, suddenly not smiling anymore as I got up.

"She is no more..." I sighed after uttering those words. She was very nice, merely going through town, starch naked, really down for some odd reason.

*flashback*

"Lady, Mama always says walking around naked is bad, y'know," I said as I came running towards her. I was gathering things for my little graveyard, some things extra to decorate the whole thing. Odin had recently passed, and I needed to put him in the ground or he would, regardless of the cold start to smell. I was 4 years old. She looked at me with dull, black eyes, and then stared at her own body.

"Crap! Not again!" she exclaimed, started looking around for her clothes. The townspeople did their best to ignore her. I sighed, and took out a piece of white cloth from my bag, and wrapped it around her, fastened it with some clips. The woman did nothing to stop me, merely stared. She had really short, black hair, almost like a man, though she was a woman.

"There you go. You should find something else to wear though, or you'll get a fever y'know!" I continued, and took her hand, dragged her along me into a tailor in town.

"Ah, little one, did you forget someth.. ah, what have we here," the old lady that owned the shop looked at the nearly naked woman who barely covered herself. The old lady was like a lot of other old ladies, and I forgot her name. she was short, a bit fat, wearing some baggy dress with long stockings and thus barely revealing any skin.

"She unfort'nat'ly lost her clothes. I have more money here, so can you find som'thin' pretty?" I asked, and the old lady smiled and went to the back.

"Yo, kiddo. You don't really need to do this.." the woman spoke softly, and I stared back at her.

"If I only did what I had to I'd feel bad. I need that quilt you're wearing for the grave as well, so you need to wear som'thin' pretty. Pretty ladies should wear pretty things after all," I said seriously, and she looked at me with wonder.

"Ah, here we are, little one. Pretty enough?" the old lady I didn't remember the name of asked as she returned, bringing with her a white dress, simple but elegant, made to reach down to the knees. That, and a pair of white boots lined with fur.

"Yep, it's REALLY pretty. How much does it cost?" I replied smiling brightly, and the old woman smiled back. She had a nice smile, a smile a lot of old people had when they watched children.

"You're such a regular by now. No pay this time, it's on me," she said, and I ran to hug her.

"Now, lady you can change in the ba.. or right there. Whatever suits you," the old woman said, shook her head while smiling, and then disappeared into the back herself as I picked up the quilt and put it back in my bag.

"Now I need to go back to my business, lady, but if you want, you can come too, y'know," I looked up at her, and she looked lost in thought. I couldn't leave her like that, so I took her hand, and headed for my sacred ground.

I placed her on a rock nearby that wasn't covered in snow, and carefully took out the rock I had chosen to become the gravestone of Odin, the deceased cat.

"Where's your Mama, girl?" she asked mildly as I took out a chisel and started engraving the name in the runes Mama taught me. They were old letters that fitted nicely on a grave.

"Mama's out huntin' again. She does that som'times. And she's sad that Odin died, though she says she isn't," I said it matter-of-factly. Mama was sad. I saw it in her eyes. Sad and guilty, though all things die.

"Odin?" she said, not knowing who this was, since I forgot to tell her.

"Yep, Odin. Odin the cat," I declared, and put the rock down, freshly carved. Then I lifted the remnants of a badly molested animal from the grave I had already dug, and showed it to her before wrapping it into the cloth the woman wore earlier.

"Ah... How did he.. become like that?" the woman asked, barely looking at Odin before looking away.

"You mean how he died? Mama went to fight this monster called Deliora, y'know, 'cause it kills things. It hit Odin, and he was in lots of pain. Then he stopped breathin'. Mama brought 'im back, 'cause she knew I'd make 'im a grave. Then he can rest without pain anymore," I felt my eyes getting a bit watery, but turned away as I carefully put him down in the dark hole in the earth, and slowly covered it with dirt.

"Y'know, lady? You have the same face like Mama when she came home. Did your cat die too?" I asked, and turned to her. She looked at me with those sad eyes. Guilty and sad.

"You're a smart girl, you know that? I did lose my cat, actually," she said while smiling.

"Liar. But I can make a grave, y'know..." I went over to her as I cried, and she cried as well.

"I'd like that," she finally said. We went looking for a big rock, and then I inscripted the name she told me in runes. Ultear. I then put a light next to it, and we stood there in silence for a while.

"What's your name, lady?" I asked after a while, and she ruffled my hair when I looked up at her.

"Ur, little girl. What's yours?" she was kind, but sad, the lady.

"I don't have one. I said I should have one in case I die, see.. or else she can't make a grave, since I got no name," I said.

"Ur is a pretty name though, it fits you. Pretty like the pretty lady," I smiled, and then hugged her once more.

"You'll find a precious one again, y'know. Mama says the end never is the end," I continued.

*flashback end*

He was a bit taken aback by my sudden change, but not as much as when I suddenly hugged him tightly.

"I'm glad you're still alive, Gray Fullbuster," I whispered, and then took a few steps back.

"I'm sorry... but who are you?" he asked, eventually.

"Yeah.. well. You wouldn't know me, only she did. I came here to check that her legacy was alright, and to... look for a new home," I laughed awkwardly. If I didn't laugh, I might cry, after all.

"She kinda named me, that lady. And she tried showing me some magic, but it kinda goes against my err.. other magic, so," I put my fist in my hand, and he looked baffled, before I closed my eyes.

"Ice Make, rose," I said, and a small, purplish rose appeared in my hand, tangling its stem around my wrist before shattering. I blushed slightly. Such weak magic that was. Not initially, of course, but with me as its contractor.

"So you want to join the guild, do you?" the barmaid asked, and I turned to her, smiled.

"I might try it out. How do I get in?" I replied, and she giggled.

"Just tell me where to place the stamp, dear," she answered and I reached my hand forward. I wanted it to be pink.

"Welcome to Fairy Tail," she said.

"HAH! WEAK! What kinda magic was that!?" I heard a yelling voice, and saw Natsu looking at me.

"Of course," I chuckled, and went back to the barstool, ordered some chilli and a milkshake, chocolate flavoured.

"That was uncalled for, squinty eyes!" Gray yelled, and got a remark on his droopy eyes in return. A brawl started yet again. I got my bowl of chillies that I started nibbling off while mindlessly stirring my milkshake with a straw.

"Ah, I almost forgot. What's your name? Mine is Mirajane, but everyone calls me Mira," the barmaid stood there cleaning a class, and I took a whole chilli in my mouth, chewed it slowly. Swallowed.

"Nice to meet you, Mira," I said. She stood there, awaiting my answer. I sighed.

"I do not look like a damn Salamander!" I exclaimed, remembering the discussion I had had with a man I met.

"I mean, seriously, do I look like a freaking lizard to you? Is this some kind of southern custom? To yell at me and call me a lizard?" I said, hit my head against the counter, groaned at the annoyance.

"Sorry. The man just really annoyed me. I'm Lucy, by the way. Not telling my last name though. Mama always told me I should avoid using it, at least wait until she..." I trailed off, then raised my head to pick another chilli, nibbling at it.

"That's alright. Everyone's got a rough past in this guild. That's why we become each others family," Mira said. Customers waited, so she winked and headed off. Family...


	3. Fire and Ice

I opened my eyes, and found myself in a hospital bed. The roof was white, and when I sat up I saw white curtains surrounding me.

"I see you're up," a bored voice muttered, and I saw Gray sitting on the floor next to the bed, his back resting against the wall.

"Jeez, you should've just said you were that injured. Someone or something really hit your innards hard. You have several fractured ribs, a collapsed lung, and you're bruised as hell on the inside. What the hell hit you?" he said it with the same bored tone, and I lightly touched my bruised stomach.

"Mama hit me. She was real mad, and when she is like that she's crazy strong. Guess I forgot to tell you." I said, looked down at him, before I jumped out of my bed, swayed a bit as I landed on the floor. He got up too, really fast I might add.

"Oi, don't get up yet. You should rest for at least a few days!" he protested, and I laughed as I turned towards him. It sounded a bit bitter, but couldn't be helped.

"Weirdo. I'm good. A bit sore perhaps, but I do heal a lot faster than normal people. Sorry for laughin', by the way. I only met her once, you know. That crazy woman," he stiffened by that, but clenched his fists rather than attacking.

"Why do you call her crazy?" he asked.

"She walked around town starch naked. Not many people do that, you know. And she opposed Mama by giving me a name. No one opposes Mama," I replied, smiled at the memory.

"How did I end up here, anyways?" I asked further on. The last thing I remembered was nibbling my chilli.

"Erza happened... she slammed Natsu into you, and both got knocked out cold," he said with a taint of fear in his voice.

"Who is Erza?" I asked.

"That would be me." a female voice replied, and a woman with scarlet hair approached, clad in a customised plate-body and a blue skirt. Of all things...

"I apologise for the trouble I have caused you. I heard you're from the north. Mind telling me which town, I might've been there," she continued. A very polite woman. I smiled a small smile, but refused to cry.

"You might. It doesn't got a name anymore, though. The custom is that a town is stripped of its name when it ceases to exist. Mama went to the mountains to slay this demon, 'cause he insulted her Papa, see. Thing is, there was more than one, and others came to the nearby village," I said, sighed, and stretched my arms while yawning.

"I'm starving. Might as well go down and get me some food," suddenly a pair of strong arms were around me crushing me in a tight hug. I stared at this woman that had.. one teary eye.

"It's weird, really. I used to cry a lot when I were younger, but then... There is not much reason for crying, is there. Everything extinguishes..." I calmly released myself, and I knew it came upon me, the completely calm, indifferent smile, as I stared at the two standing there.

"Even the flames surrounding the demon as it was burned alive," I continued.

"..Burned..?" Gray muttered, and I smiled i a less scary manner before heading for the door.

"Guess I forgot to tell you, Gray. I'm a fire mage, which is why my ice magic is so bad, by the way," then I headed downstairs.

I ordered another bowl of chilli, and started nibbling one again. I don't really eat much. What's the point?

"Mira! I want a fire chicken!" I heard a voice call, and saw Natsu the motion sick kid sit a few seats away. Mira, the barmaid, gave confirmation and disappeared out back to prepare the meal.

"Yo. Heard you knocked me out cold yesterday," I said, and he turned around, stared at me.

"Ah, you're the weak Ice mage. Luigi, right?" he countered, and I felt... annoyance.

"That would be me." I said stiffly. Fine, be that way. I am surprised such feelings still lingers. True enough, the yelling stranger had irked me, but that incident had some time building up. And calling me Luigi? I sighed, and grabbed for another chilli. Damn, they were all gone.

Mira came out that very moment as I took out two rocks from my pocket. She had with her a large... ablaze..? chicken. They could do that? Not that I would be able to devour a chicken of that size, but the fire... I sighed again. Southerners sure were odd people. I held the two rocks up, tried finding my magic. It had been a while since I actually enjoyed a decent meal, so it might take some time. Since people seemed okay with Natsu eating in here, I might as well enjoy some too.

"What is that?" he asked, breaking my concentration.

"Food," I answered, then turned my concentration back to the rocks.

"You eat rocks?" Gray asked, he had arrived at the hall himself now. I felt annoyance yet again. It felt weird.

"Shut it and I'll show you. It took forever finding.. getting here, so it has been a while, but..." suddenly a hand snatched my rocks, and I stared as the pink-haired mage smelled them.

"They smell like fire," he stated. I blinked. Calm down.

"That would be why they are called fire stones then. Now, give 'em back," I said, my voice cold with suppressed rage.

"Why. You're an Ice mage, Luigi. What do you need fire for?" he said, and I snapped, snatched the rocks from him.

"They were a gift from Mama. Get it? You, of all, will not be able to understand," I stalked off, into the woods.

I was breathing hard, trying to calm my senses. One of the side effects of fire magic, emotions had the tendency of getting the better of me. Really, Mama always said that I shouldn't have been able to master it the way I did since I always remained so calm. I was the child that seemingly hardly ever cried. Hardly ever lost her temper. Hardly ever.. felt anything.. beyond a basic level.

"Oi, Luigi!" I heard a voice call. It had been hearing it in my dream for some time, so I guessed the boy had been looking for me for a while now.

"Natsu, I found her!" another said, and I cracked an eye open. There, in front of me, stood the blue cat, and the pink-haired mage came running soon after.

"Finally, found you," he said, leaning on his knees while catching his breath.

"Really. Why look in the first place? I am perfectly able to take care of myself," I stated calmly.

"Aww... come on, I'm sorry about those rocks, Luigi. I didn't know your mum gave 'em to you," he said, and sat down next to me.

"My name is Lucy... and of course you didn't know. I didn't tell you," I countered, looking straight ahead. I sighed.

"I know, that's what I said. And I'm sorry, so look at me, please?" he asked, his voice pleading.

"You are as hotheaded as your magic, aren't you?" I said, facing him like he wanted me to.

"Hey! I'm not hotheaded!" he exclaimed, and pouted. I could see my mothers amusement when it came to pouting faces. Such a weird face...

"I envy you," I said, and got up, stretched my stiff body. I had been sleeping for a while, it would seem, and sitting and sleeping with my back against a tree in this pissing rain wasn't too pleasant.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" the fire mage exclaimed, without sounding too angry.

"I bet that your flames are bright and ever changing like your mood. Mine, however..." I took the rocks out, ground them together, creating a single spark. That was all I needed, as my hand suddenly were engulfed in a round, purple flame, the same that usually could be seen in a flame before it was extinguished. Natsu stared at it. I lifted my hand a bit, closed my eyes.

Then, with a sudden movement I trusted it into the ground. The effect was immediate, and terrifying. The whole area around me exploded in flames, hot and almost lazily devouring everything living in the circle in the matter of seconds, leaving me in a black little crater, as Natsu blinked. Once. Twice.

"Fight me!" he yelled. I smiled calmly, shook my head.

"My flames are dying, and they make everything around me die. I do not wish to end you," I said. He didn't listen. His fist merely lit up with the bright flame that showed me what kind of person he was, and he yelled a battle cry as he came towards me. His fist collided with my palm, and his fire died, before I thrust him into the nearest tree using the grip I had on his fist.

"As I said. My flames make everything around me die. That includes your flames," I sighed, and returned to the guild. Might as well order some of that burning chicken to fill my reserves with energy.


	4. Dragon Magic

I sat by the bar, staring into space when the barmaid approached.

"I heard you lost your village to a demon," Mira said, and I blinked. My village? Mine?

"Ah.. May I try a fire chicken, please? Perhaps a smaller one than the one Natsu would have, but..." I said to her as she seemed to be focused on me. She stared at me oddly, but nodded and soon returned with my order, then leaned over the counter clearly awaiting an answer.

"It was a nearby village. I didn't live in it. It was small, but burying them all was... time consuming," I said, and then started nibbling off the chicken, unaffected by the heat.

"You buried them all?" she asked, and I looked up.

"It is one of the few human traits I find appealing. Showing respect for that which was. That which is is a whole different matter. All things end eventually," my voice was calm. What else could it be? Calm was good. Calm was like dying. Not being dead, but merely losing what was life. Passion.

"So.. was this a long time ago?" Mira asked further. Quite prying, this one.

"Depends on your perception of time. Would you call a year short, or a day long?" I answered, and then the doors busted open.

"Fight me!" yelled Natsu as he flung himself at me. I turned, and once again stopped his flaming fist with my palm, extinguishing his fire once more.

"No," I replied, and then sent him flying across the hall before turning back to a baffled Mira.

"It took a week to retrieve all the bodies and bury them. The cold kept them from rotting, but it also froze the ground and made it hard to dig in it. Since a lot of people were mauled badly by the demons claws, I had difficulty placing all families together. I gave them names when I didn't remember the ones they used when alive, and then wrote the names on their graves. It was silent. Another week passed when I searched for Ur, and then found out she ended. I guess it is closing in on three weeks, now, since then. Would you refer to it as long, or short?" I answered her question, and she got paler as I continued on.

"Short, I think. But five weeks, wouldn't we have heard news of such destruction by now?" she commented, the barmaid, sent a glance to Master Makarov, whom sat eyeing me with... curiosity? I couldn't quite place the expression he wore.

"It is the North, and it is winter. The town is isolated during winter. Wait for the Spring, when what ended last year lives anew. They will find the graves, they will offer the final greeting, and the town will be erased from the maps. Such is the tradition where I lived, since hesitation will kill others that still are." I explained.

"Who taught you your magic, girl?" Master asked, changed the subject. It might be for the best, most people had problems with death.

"Mama did," I replied simply. What an odd question.

"Yet she tried to kill you?" he commented, pointed towards my stomach. So he had heard of that.

"She tried saving me. Mama is very strong, and hit me too hard when she pushed me aside. She was mad too, and hurt." I explained.

"Does she have a name?" he inquired further.

"Maya, though she told me her last name was a secret, and that I shouldn't tell people," I replied. Where was he going with this? What did Mama have to do with anything?

"And where did she learn her magic?" Master asked.

"Papa," I replied.

"And where did he learn his magic?" I laughed when he asked. Such a weird question.

"I don't know where, but I don't think he learnt it anywhere. He's even stronger than Mama, and Mama is a lot stronger than me," I replied, grinned, and then continued eating. I was hungry, and if the old man planned to keep this question round going for much longer my food would go cold.

"Do you happen to know his name?" the man asked. I noted that Natsu had recovered and slowly walked towards us.

"Papas? 'course I know his name. But what does it matter?" I said, and then stopped eating for a second.

"Your father is strong?" Natsu asked, sat down and started taking chunks of my chicken and ate it. I ignored it, were full anyways.

"Just tell me his name," Master said with urgency.

"I.. I'm not sure if I'm supposed to tell you. I think he's pretty well known in the south," I said hesitantly.

"Was he.. erm.. by any means a Dragon Slayer?" Mirajane asked.

"What kind of question is that? Of course he isn't..." I shrugged, and yawned. Someone laughed nervously. They seemed relieved, somehow. Relieved, that Papa was not a Slayer of Dragons.

"Why the hell would anyone wish to slay a dragon?" I asked sharply. Why would they even suspect such a thing?

"A Dragon Slayer uses Dragon Slayer magic, girl. Your magic resembles that type of magic, is all," Master explained, and I shrugged.

"You people are weird.." I muttered, mostly to myself.

"What kind of magic do you use, anyways?" the old man continued.

"Mama calls it Dragon Magic." I replied. People sighed. As if.. I was a child that did not get the notion.

"Well, show 'em, Lucy! Show'em your magic, use those magic rocks of yours!" Natsu said, looked upon my being, looking for the stones I had used earlier.

"I have eaten." I said, and then lit my palm on fire. The flame was still purplish, but a tad less lazy in its movements today. Perhaps due to the lack of rain?

"I would call that Dragon Slayer magic, though it is peculiar..." Master stated, and I felt myself becoming annoyed.

"Why would Papa wish to kill dragons? Why would Igneel wish to MURDER others.." I stopped when I realised what I'd done. I'd mentioned his name. Damn. Again with my feelings going haywire.

"Why would he wish to kill others of his kind?!" I ended, though a bit too late, I guess, when people suddenly stared at me in confusion.

"You know Igneel?" Natsu asked. I stared at him, dumbfounded.

"I never met him..." I said, calming down again. Breathe, Lucy. They just misunderstood something. They did not ACCUSE anyone.

"But you mentioned his name," he said, urging me to continue.

"He's my Papa. I never met him, but Mama has told me stories," I stated. He seemed disappointed. Master on the other hand looked at me as if I just grew a second head.

"Are you human, child?" the old man asked, and it did seem as if he dreaded the reply to come.

"What a stupid question. Of course I am," I answered. Humans are weird, sometimes calling their own inhuman due to their actions. I didn't understand humans when they did that. How could a murderer lose his right to belong to the race he was born into due to he way he acted? Master nodded, but seemed to be in deep thought.

"I didn't know there was a mage named Igneel in Fiore, though," he muttered, seemingly to himself. Igneel.. a mage?

"He's not a mage. That would be stupid, and cause a lot of destruction. Just imagine him wandering around in towns, people would freak out..." I sighed, and playfully made a ball with the flames on my hand.

"But he taught your mother magic," Master commented. Well, just because he knew magic, that did not mean he HAD to be a mage.

"Yeah, Dragon Magic. Igneel is a Fire Dragon, like DUH," I uttered, separated the flame from my palm, and grinned briefly. Perhaps the fire-eater would like some. The whole guild froze after processing my words for a moment.

"So you DO know Igneel!" Natsu exclaimed.

"Like I said, never me him. Mama had a big fight him a long time ago, so even though she was his mate she never got to tell him he had a dau.." I began, but I didn't get to finish.

"Wait.. his mate?" Natsu interrupted me, blinked, and I nodded.

"Yeah... it's a dragon thing, kind of hard to explain." I replied.

"I know what it is," he said.

"That's surprising," I said back, looked at the boy. He looked back. His eyes where focused, and I suddenly stood up, bowed near him, sniffed.

"I'll be damned. You smell... peculiar," I commented. How come I hadn't noticed that before? Wasn't like I made a habit of sniffing people really, but I should've noticed something like this.

"So, your mothers name is Maya Dragneel?" Master asked, and I blinked.

"Like I said, she and Papa had a fight a long time ago. Why would she keep his last name, that would be weird. I guess I can't keep it a secret, though, since you all know Papa. Mamas full name is Maya Clive," I sighed, and then noticed that everyone stopped dead again.

"C..Clive, you say?" Master asked, seemed to have problems saying the last name of my mother. Her family name.

"Hm? Yeah." I replied, and a woman sitting and drinking from a barrel spewed everything out on the table, and looked at me in disbelief.

"Has she ever mentioned any family?" Master continued questioning.

"Hm? Like Uncle? Mama said he travels a lot, and that he does reckless things. She also called him a wimp, but most people are compared to her," I said, shrugged, and then yawned again. It had been a long day.

"I wonder if there are any graveyards nearby..." I muttered to myself and headed out of the guild, ignoring the loud EH?! coming from the inside. And I needed to find a candle shop too.


	5. Graveyard

I got out of the store holding two big bags with white candles. They were expensive in the south, or perhaps I just got used to all the discounts the old man in the village back north would give me. Old Gramps. He used to give me food too, sometimes during winter, when food was hard to get by. I had started fending for myself rather early, after all.

In the beginning Old Gramps would ask me about my home, but as the years flew by he stopped, and merely helped out. Humans are weird. Why would the whereabouts of my home and parents matter to him? True, Mama hardly ever went to the town, so I guess very few people ever saw her, but... she was real. I wasn't a liar. Not an orphan either, whatever that was. The tone they said the word in just told me I wasn't. Pity is a feeling I despise.

"Hm, I think it would be around here..." I mumbled for myself as I looked around looking for the graveyard I had heard would be in Magnolia. There.

"Whoa, these are nice graves," I mumbled as I walked through the gates and started doing my business. One candle for every name, mostly one per grave. There were many graves, some tended to and some not. Some were old and mossy, some newer. Some people died young, and some had gotten old. The place was silent. I like silence.

Almost done. Some of these stones and flowerbeds needed attendance. I would see to it, but later on. It would give me something to do. Something to calm me down. There, the last candle.

"What are you doing?" I jumped and turned around to see an old man looking at me. He was wearing black and white, a silver cross around his neck. A priest, perhaps.

"Paying respect to that which was," I answered. I still had a few candles left, but would have to buy more next time, since I had used more than half of them. The graveyard was bigger than what I was used to. Up North graves were often replaced after a few decades.. The graves were often replaced as younger relatives took their places, and the older names would get a plaque next to it.

"To everyone? I haven't seen you around before, do you come from Magnolia?" the priest asked. He didn't sound scolding, but curious.

"I have never been to this place before," I answered his last question.

"So where do you come from?" he asked.

"The North." I replied.

"It is rare for a stranger to pay respect to so many souls she never knew. Are you going to light all these candles as well?" the priest continued.

"There are many people I don't know, most of them I will never know. I like graveyards, since there is no suffering here. No cries of pain. Only silence," I said, standing by a stone wall at the end of the graveyard, before I sat down. The sky was clear, and slowly darkening. Soon it would be nighttime.

"I will have to partly disagree with you there, girl, but this is a place of serenity. People usually come her to mourn the loved ones that got taken away," as if to prove his point, I could hear faint crying, and saw a lady in black leaning forward, crying by a grave. A friend, a father, a child. Perhaps what would have been her mate.

"Crying is a waste of time," I muttered, looking at her.

"Yet many find it appealing. It is not my business meddling in their ways of handling grief," I added, and looked back at the priest.

"It's getting late, and I get the impression that southerners dislike the cold. The ground will rime tonight, so you might want to head home old man," I said as I looked at him, and he eyed me. He did not seem like the type that liked the cold. I could see it in his tense shoulders that he yearned for the warmth awaiting him in a house.

"I am waiting for all to leave before I close the gates. Are you planning on spending the night, young one? Most people find this place a scary place at night, calling it haunted due to the dead that reside here," the priest said, that strange gleam in his eyes. Amusement, perhaps? Scolding? And people usually closed the gates at night? Weird. I chuckled.

"If they came out, it would be less lonely, but as you will. I'll just light the candles and leave," I replied, got up, closed my eyes. Come on. I knew the number of candles, reached out to all of them. There.

"Burn brightly... Fire Dragons Light," I said silently, and opened my eyes at the same time as hundreds of lights lit up with a blue flame, soon returning to a normal yellowish colour as the wax took over the job of keeping them alight. They were all in small glasses in order to keep them from making anything else catch fire. Hopefully I wouldn't need to make any more of those in the future. My glassmaking skills were limited, so many of them had rather uniques shapes. I was also almost out of sand.

"Who are you, girl?" the priest asked, and I tilted my head.

"I am Lucy, but you don't know me, so not knowing my name is alright. I came down.. yesterday I think. From the North." I said, looked at my right hand, and smiled. The mark that was there. I wasn't sure how long I were out after Erza the scarlet mage knocked me unconscious.

"You might know my new family though. It's a guild called Fairy Tail. Technically that would make me Lucy of Fairy Tail," I continued, showed my hand with the pink mark, held it up to him so he could see it in the slowly dimming light, dimming because of the receding sun. Then I turned, walked towards the gate. The crying woman had cried in terror when I lit the candles. I knew the sound of terror. Flashing images of corpses and blood filled my head, but I shook my head to clear it. This wasn't the time. Nor was it the place.

"Do you have a home, Lucy of Fairy Tail?" the priest asked after me. I stopped, turned to him at the gate. I had almost left, but he did not seem finished questioning me. Just like Old Gramps at the candle shop up North. Wondering where I lived.

"Not at the moment, but it's alright. There are no blizzards approaching, and I can live with rime. If I need to I can always camp in the woods, seeing the sacred ground is off limits as the sun sets. Northerners are quite able to freeze, but not as able as the southerners. As a fire mage I will manage even better," I said, waved at him, and left. He didn't need to worry. The house I used to live in hadn't been there for years. Living outside was.. normal.

Wow... there was a house. In the forest. The sun had set a while ago, and I had wandered off into the forest to find a place to settle down. Since my tracking skills were rather poor I had followed a path, and though I knew SOMEONE would have to use it in order for it to be there in the first place, I didn't expect to be a house.

Now, what to do... Obviously I couldn't stay here. Humans found it strange whenever they woke up to find random strangers sleeping outside. I would've thought so too, though I had experienced it from time to time. They usually wanted food, shelter or valuables, those strangers. I could oblige to he first two, but the third would earn people a hit to the head and a demand towards them to leave. Good old days...

The people here probably didn't want to be disturbed though, and I didn't like imposing. It felt wrong, somehow, and Mama taught me to avoid being in peoples debts. So, did I continue or should I head back. I honestly preferred sleeping in forests rather than hard cobble that would meet me in the back alleys of a town. But who knew, people might be living in houses if I followed the next trail too, and if I left the trail... I wouldn't die or anything, but I might be gone for a while. Perhaps I should...

"Lucy?" a voice called out, and I turned in surprise only to see Natsu standing there. Had he been following me? Did he want to fight?

"What are you doing here?" he asked, and it clicked. He lived here. It was HIS house.

"Aye!" his cat chimed in. I cocked my head to the side. He might know.

"Do people live at the end of that trail?" I asked and pointed at the continuing trail. If people DID live there I would accept the cobbles, for now. He looked at it.

"No... why?" he asked, looked back at me.

"Good," I said, started walking towards it. Hopefully I might find a good spot soon. If nothing else, I might find a spot to use in the future. Natsu grabbed my arm, and I turned to face him.

"Where are you going?" he asked.

"Into the forest," I replied. Obviously. Where else would I be going when I asked him about the trail and headed in that direction?

"Yeah, I figured, but what are you going to do there?" he asked. An odd question. It was late. What did he THINK I would be doing in the forest in the middle of the night?

"I'm finding a place to sleep. I didn't think anyone would be living out here, though. Not that it matters," I explained to him.

"You don't have a place to stay?" he asked, didn't move to let me go. That question again. It was annoying me. A little. Had I not already established that?

"If you mean like a house, no. My home burned down a while ago, and was in the North for that matter. I lived in a cave for a while, then here and there on my way to this place." I continued my explanation. Why did everyone keep asking me about my home?

"Didn't your mother get you a new one or something? Usually when a place burns down, you get a new one," he said, a tad awkwardly. He said it as if houses just grew on trees or something. And though most of them most certainly were made up by trees, they did not just grow ON them. Well, not normally in any case. Besides...

"Mama is out hunting," I said. She was angry, and when she was angry it would be best to leave her alone until she calmed down. She would most likely yell at me when she figured out I had left the town, but... I didn't want to stay there after everyone died. There was, apparently, such a thing as too much silence.

"It's going to be freezing cold outside tonight," he continued, and I nodded.

"I'm a fire mage. The cold doesn't bother me," I replied, and he sighed.

"You're welcome to stay the night on my couch." he muttered.

"I don't want to impose," I replied, and made a move to walk away when he groaned and dragged me towards his house.

"And I don't want you wandering the bloody forest on your own freezing your ass off. Come on," he said, and like that, I got dragged into a very messy home. It smelled dirty, musty, and fiery. Considering the heaps of things laying around, it didn't actually smell so bad. Kind of homey. It was one room, a bed in one end, a kitchen in another, and then a couch in front of a fireplace. I guessed the couch to be mine, then. There was one other door, one that most likely led to the bathroom.

"Home sweet home," he said while smiling, and then headed straight for the bathroom. I sat down on the couch after scooping a few things off it.

"Does he do that often?" I asked the cat.

"Aye! Does what?" the cat asked. He sure said Aye a lot.

"Invite strangers into his house." I asked. Mama would say it's best to leave such people alone, since one never knows what they might want. Like those strangers that wanted valuables.

"But you're not a stranger, Lucy, you're part of Fairy Tail!" the cat said. And I got accepted before they knew anything about me. A strange guild, Fairy Tail.

"Hm." I hummed and laid down, closed my eyes. One night. Fair enough. I could repay him later, I guess.

"He usually lights up the fire before he goes to bed though," the cat added, and I smiled. I saw the implication, and opened my eyes and looked at the fireplace. It already had poles of wood ready to be ignited. I also spotted some matches laying next to the place, and figured he liked keeping it edible. No worried for me though, my flames would be edible enough for the boy. I rolled off the bed and squatted in front of the fireplace.

"Cat, can I take it you want me to light this up?" I asked, just to be sure.

"Aye, and my name's Happy," the cat replied. Happy, eh? Seemed like a fitting name. I took a short intake of air and blew a thin line of fire on the wood, that was ablaze in an instant. Then I got up and headed for the couch yet again. I was already fast asleep by the time Natsu came out of the bathroom, done with whatever he did in there. Probably a shower. I didn't care.


	6. River

When I woke up I was covered by a blanket. And I was laying on a couch. In a house... Oh, Natsus home. It was the crack of dawn, and I sat up while yawning. A new day.

I got up and noticed the boy sleeping soundly in his bed, his blanket long since discarded showing off an impressive set of abdominal muscles. Abs, was it? At the moment he was only clad in his underwear. Breakfast. Okay, so I was no master chef. My cooking skills were limited to burning stuff, mostly. This guy might have that thing called a frying pan, though. Add some butter, and suddenly the food would taste completely different after being prepared. One of the great mysteries of this world. First I might need to do my morning routine, though.

A FEW HOURS LATER

I arrived back at his house, soaking wet and carrying one huge fish along with a few smaller ones. Natsu just opened the door and looked at me, still tired it would seem. He had probably woken up fairly recently.

"I don't have any money, so consider this payment for the accommodation you offered last night. I don't really know how to cook either, but I figured that Happy at least would like his raw," I said, dropped the fish, shook my whole body in attempt to at least get rid of some water before it started to freeze. My hair was already getting stiff.

"Uhm... thanks?" he said, his brows furrowed.

"FISH! I love you, Lucy!" Happy yelled and flew out the door towards the heap.

"No you don't, but I appreciate the gesture," I replied, and then took off. It had been a long morning. I got lost, and when I finally found a river, it was deeper than I expected it to be. The ice was also easier to break through. It might be best if I kept away from that cat from now on. He brought up unpleasant memories. Cats. I like animals, but most of them tend to dislike me. Something about the way I smell.

I entered the guild, cold and still kind of wet, regardless of my efforts in trying to run it off. Hey, at least I was clean.

"What happened to you?" Gray commented from way over at the bar.

"Went for a bath," I muttered as I made my way over there and sat down next to him.

"Your lips are blue," he continued, clearly sceptic about my reasoning.

"It was a long bath," I added. It was a long bath, and I lost my shoes. And my toothbrush. And my money.

"What, you go for a swim in the ocean or something?" he asked sarcastically. I could tell he didn't believe my half truth.

"Don't be stupid. Salt water hardly works as a cleaning substance," I replied matter-of-factly, without denying the fact that I had been there. To the ocean, I mean. And it was true, cleaning my body in the ocean would be stupid, not to speak of the fact that the ocean left a lot of space for a fish to run off to. He waited.

"Though I guess I ended up there in the end..."I mumbled. Didn't explain much perhaps, but I was hardly in the mood for explanations. Why did he need to know? He raised a brow at me, and I sighed.

"Say, how do you make money in a guild?" I knew the theory. Something about taking on jobs, but how did one do that? And it served as a good distraction too.

"You pick a request on the board and get it approved by Master," he explained, and pointed at a board with a lot of papers on it. I nodded. Fair enough, that sounded like an easy task. I got up, closed my eyes. Focus. Focus on your fists. There, the movement must be swift yet powerful.

Suddenly I hit my fists together and they ignited, sending a wave of heat around me, thawing and drying my body. Then I was back to normal, a dry girl heading for he board. I stumbled a bit. Shit. I might've reduced my hypothermia to a more bearable level, but my magic was depleted, and severely so. Fishing in the river probably wasn't such a good idea after all. Not that it was my first idea anyways. I was better at catching birds.

"Approve this," I said as I handed a note to the old man, ignoring a little kid standing behind me.

"Wait a minute dear. Now young man, your father is a Fairy Tail mage and sending someone after him will only hurt his pride, here you go, Lucy," he didn't even look at it before he stamped it and put it away. Then he kept on arguing with the kid, but I chose to ignore it. Not my business. I did stop when I saw the kid leaving though, and I heard where mentioned father was. Might take a look on my way to my destination. They were relatively close...

AND THUS...

Wow. This place was cold, as in REALLY cold. And I was lost. Walking here definitely wasn't a god idea. People also failed to mention that this place had a lot of wyverns, as in beings that resembled, and despised, dragons...

TWO WEEKS LATER...

The town was busy like always in spite of the cold season, people hustling about in their furry winter-clothing. I needed some clothing in general, since my current clothing was a tad worse for wear. Now when I thought about it, I hadn't seen my bag since I woke up in the infirmary... In any case, my denim shorts had started disintegrating, being slightly charred and ripped, my t-shirt had long since been ripped to shreds, so bandages covered my breasts in order to keep me decent.

People stared at me oddly where I passed, barely wearing enough clothing to cover myself in what they probably referred to as a freezing cold day. Southerners, so prone to freezing... I also showed off faint markings after big claws, but they had almost healed now, and the scars would fade in no time. I still had no shoes, but I had money now, and would buy some basics later, when I possessed my bag once more.

I kicked the doors open, walked in with a neutral expression and headed for the bar. I heard a squeal. Wait... squeal? That was all I managed to process before Mira was there, in front of me, her eyes worried.

"Lucy! Oh my gosh, I was just about to send someone after you! What did you think when you took that request?!" Mira the barmaid scolded, and I saw Master staring at me. I wasn't sure whether or not he was checking me for injuries or merely checking me out.

"Request?" I questioned, a bit put off by the close proximity.

"Yes, to take out that notorious killer! That's an A-rank mission you know!" she continued. I held up my sole possession, a small bag with my prize.

"He's in prison now. I took him out," I said. Sure, he was strong. He called me names. He hit me. People get tired after hitting someone enough times. Being hit by a human, even if he is strong, doesn't bother me. He would have to be crazy strong to beat me up for real. Turns out, he wasn't.

"That's not the point, and where were you all this time anyways? I was worried about you you know. You were supposed to be back after a few days. It's been two weeks!" she almost yelled, looked mad. Would she hit me now? Some people hit other people when they are mad. Mama did, but she didn't get mad this quickly, and not over something this trivial. This woman didn't even know me.

"I got lost," I answered. Another half truth. I honestly did get lost, though the reason behind it would be a detour to a certain mountain with way too much snow. And monsters. The barmaid sighed, dragged me over to the bar and signalled me to sit before handing me a hot cup of chocolate.

"What are those markings? Old scars?" she asked as she stood right in front of me still, with only the counter between us.

"I got very lost, and I heal quickly," I answered, and sipped at the cup. Heat I didn't have to produce myself ran down my throat. It felt good.

"Hey, Lucy! Were you at Mt. Hakobe the other day?" Natsu yelled as he came running at me. I stopped his flaming fist before it reached its destination. How did he know, and why would it interest him?

"So that's what that mountain is called..." I replied, and sipped at my chocolate again. I let the human get away. How did I know who he was? The creep was he only one to fawn on me rather than have his instincts make him sneer. And he got away. Pity, the kid would have to live with the fact that his father no longer stayed human.

"You saw her and didn't tell me?" Mira asked, sent a very scary glare towards the fire mage, and he visibly shrunk before her.

"YOU!?" a shout could be heard, and I turned to see a man staring at me. He seemed shocked.

… I didn't know him.

"I don't know you, but don't worry. I don't know a lot of people," I said. Then I stopped. Noticed the kid behind him. That kid.. him I DID recognise. He was the child I had seen arguing with Master the day I left on my mission.

"Ah. You're the le... THAT guy," the lecher, I almost called him. 'Cause he was. But adults tended to yell when I used mean words. So I changed the word just in time.

"You went to Mt. Hakobe?" Mirajane asked, and I stared at her.

"Like I said. I got very lost. It tends to happen a lot. Then there were a LOT of animals around. I needed to run a lot, and I ruined my shirt... that reminds me, have you seen my bag?" I hadn't seen Natsu while being there. Guess the lecher remembered me or something. Though he HAD been under the influence of the beast that had taken over him, he might still recall some of the things that had happened. Like the fact that he attempted to kidnap me into some cave.

"What are those markings you have on your body, child?" Master asked, and I looked down.

"Oh, these? Wolves at Mt. Hakobe aren't very nice... They chased me for the longest time, until I ran into a pack of wyverns. Thankfully I managed to dodge most of their attacks, and these are only shallow claw-marks." I decided to reply. It wasn't very valuable information. And with shallow, I really meant shallow. Didn't even bleed much.

"Here's your bag, by the way, and where are your shoes?" Mira said, had disappeared at some point, and now reappeared with my bag.

"My shoes got lost while I took a bath... I have money now though, so I might buy new ones," I mused, halfway to myself while I dragged another black shirt out of my bag, and put it on. Ahh, the feeling of clothing on my upper body...

"You didn't ruin ANYTHING though.. that is quite an accomplishment," she said after a short silence as people probably tried understanding my statement. Ah, I guess I only told Gray about my last bath... The one where I ended up in the ocean before I went on the mission. And not ruining anything? By the time I arrived in the town where the criminal was I was out of magic power. As in COMPLETELY out of magic power. Hungry... Tired... I was still pretty out of it. Even Natsu almost got me with that attack of his earlier.

"Sorry, but I might've accidentally burned a few buildings..." I added. Most of them were ruins, but still. People dislike fire, even if it saves their life, since it just as easily can take it away. There were some people too...

"Huh? I didn't hear any complaints though," added Master.

"Well, it was mostly their fault, anyways. Some guys talking about fairies, I think they were mental or something, 'cause they attacked without any reason. First people call me a lizard, then a fairy. People in the south sure are strange." I commented, yawned, and then spotted another character nearing. Without a word I dragged another black shirt out of my bag, one that was bigger than the one I was wearing at the moment.

"You sure are a hassle at times," I muttered, and before Gray got to enter the conversation I forced the t-shirt over his head. Mirajane laughed a little, and I turned towards the bar area. Perhaps I should sleep some here. Suddenly I got up, shook my head.

"I think I should go for another bath..." I muttered, partly to myself. I probably smelled, and I probably smelled pretty bad.

"In the ocean?" asked Gray, now when he had gotten the shirt on, and I shook my head.

"Of course not. Salt water gets stuck in my hair," I replied. Salt water made my hair stiff and hard to work with.

"But you did swim in the ocean last time..." he commented.

"No..." what on earth was Gray on about? I didn't go swimming in the ocean.

"You swam in the ocean?" asked Natsu. I shook my head again.

"Don't be silly." I said. How hard could it be? I DIDN'T swim in the ocean.

"But you said.." Gray began.

"I said I ended up in the ocean," I corrected. He had to be talking about that day. That day two weeks ago.

"The day when you went fishing?" Natsu shot in.

"I guess I did bring the fish that day... but I didn't really go fishing either. It just ended up that way." I explained. Things happened. And as they happened I ended up in the ocean, and I ended up with fish.

"So what were you doing by the ocean?" Gray asked, and I tugged his shirt down before it could make its way off him again.

"If you have to know, some fishermen caught me in their nets, and I got the fish as thanks for entertaining them or something. They called me a mermaid," I replied. Yes, I had been called a mermaid, which was weird, considering my circumstances.

"How did you end up there?" Gray asked.

"I woke up early, and thought I should wash up, so I went in search for a river. I found one, but then I fell in. I think I lost my shoes around the second rapids, and then I was washed out to sea." I explained, gave them the easy explanation.

"…" Gray just stared, seemed out of words.

"Lucy dear... I'm sorry to ask you this, but.. can you swim?" Mirajane asked, and I looked at her.

"Nope. I'm pretty much a rock in water." I answered, and all of them looked at me strangely. Somewhat distressed, perhaps?

"Then I shall personally teach you how to swim. Right now!" Erza declared. Where had she been all this time, and why did everyone suddenly look very scared?


	7. Swimming

"Every day is a trial where you fight for the right to see another one," Mama declared while squatting next to me by the riverbed. She was smiling that wolfy grin of hers, the wind toying with her blonde hair. At the moment she wore a pair or ripped shorts and a black bikini-top.

"You can swim, right?" she asked. I nodded to confirm the question that wasn't really a question.

"Well, it's time to unlearn it," she declared then, and with that, she pushed me into the rapids.

Many things I could say about Mama. Strong. Caring. Loyal. Crazy could be added to that list just as easily. She had her special days, that particular day being one of those, when she found new and more creative ways to educate me in the art of surviving. Lesson learned.

Sadly though, at the moment a red-haired mass of fury was waiting on the other side of the water-edge waiting for me to unlearn the unlearning, or rather... she was waiting for me to relearn how to swim. Easier said than done. Hence me slowly sinking in the ocean, my limbs unmoving, drowning while reminiscing the good old days when things were a lot simpler.

"Do you know why I made you do that?" Mama asked. I didn't answer where I lay soaking wet on a rock by the end of the third set of rapids, bruised, battered and with lungs full of water. Mama would tell me regardless of my response, or lack thereof.

"Before you learn how to swim, you fear death and panic when you lose control in the swirling mass of water. It's as if you are caught in a net that tightens the more you struggle. Then, when you learn to swim, you learn to fight the grasp, escape from the net that follows you. The better you swim, the farther ahead you will be from the net..." she stopped, her forehead furrowed a bit.

"You still fear death, though. That doesn't change. Remember me saying how every day is a struggle where you fight to see another day? In order to fight it, you have to face it, head on. Show fear and you will be at a disadvantage. Unlearn how to swim in order to fight Death. Running away is for wimps anyways," and there it was, that smile. The feral grin with an extra edge to it. It meant another idea was forming in her head. Another lesson that would teach me how to survive in this harsh world.

Well... I had followed her lesson, and true enough, I had survived so far. Her lessons had taught me to face things head on, regardless of my chance for survival. Then I would have no regrets if Death was to claim me. Now though... Fairy Tail wanted me to learn how to swim again. I was pretty sure the woman named Erza Scarlet would end me if I didn't, or worse..

Could I do it? I didn't know. Just one way to find out, face it head on, like Mama would want me to. I opened my mouth, and bubbles burst out, slowly heading for the surface. Oh yeah, there was that minor issue regarding air. The bottom of the ocean... About time. While breathing in a good gulp of seawater I kicked off, sending me several meters upwards before I forced my arms above me, to the side in a single stroke that brought me to the surface.

There is a certain euphoric sensation that comes with mastering a new skill. I felt my mouth twist into a wide grin as I waved at Erza where she stood smiling approvingly, Gray and Natsu in the background waving back. They must've snuck out to the back of the guild at some point to see how I was faring. The moment of bliss passed quickly though as I felt the familiar sensation of doom come upon me moments before a giant fish swallowed me whole. What can I say, my luck has never been the best.

"If it isn't the mermaid resurfacing once more, eh? What brought you to the ocean today, girl?" the man greeted me as I landed on deck. I had just been spit out once more onto the deck of the very same fishing boat that had encountered me before, a jolly fisherman smiling sweetly at me.

"I was learning how to swim," I replied in all honesty, and he laughed heartily.

"You ought to be more careful, though I must say you have brought me a good catch twice in a row now. I'll bring you back to your guild, eh, so your family can stop worrying," he offered. Family. I had gotten the habit of referring to Fairy Tail as family already. It felt.. natural.

The fisherman insisted on bringing me the whole way to the shore, saying something about not wanting to fish me up for the second time in a day. After setting me off and warning me to be careful he waved and took off again, and I stood in the area behind the guild once more, kind of smelling like fish but otherwise unharmed. Since I had a feeling that my new family might wish to be told of my continued survival I chose to enter the guild right away instead of looking for a river to wash up in first.

As I entered the guild they greeted me in their useful cheery manner, raising their glasses as if toasting for an old friend. I smiled as well, started heading for the bar when.. a fist connected with my face, efficiently sending me flying into a wall.

I needn't see who the fist belonged to, as my brain recalled a familiar "fight me!" just before the impact. The guild was hushed in shocked silence, and when the dust settled I saw an astounded Natsu look at his fist, looking at it and wondering what just happened. The look made me laugh, a high pitched laughter I hadn't even heard myself for a long time, though it still held some of the spite. Reminded me of Mama. Sort of wolfy. This made him look up, and I grinned widely.

"Looks like you got me, dragon boy. It's on!" I exclaimed, and with that I launched myself at him, barely seeing his own smile returning before we clashed and yet another brawl started in the guildhall, soon involving most members present.

"It's a good thing you finally learned how to swim, Erza was about to explode right there. If you think she's scary now.." Natsu was attempting smalltalk while we made our way over to his place. He had insisted on having me stay there until I got a place of my own despite the fact that I could manage the cold just fine. Like my mother used to say, if you don't need to fight to survive, then you soon forget how to survive.

"Lucy?" he asked. He probably picked up on the fact that my mind was sort of elsewhere.

"Oh, just continue talking if you want, I'm listening," I said, and he stopped, looked at me oddly.

"You're weird." he stated.

"Aye!" Happy the cat chimed in.

"Some people say that. They also call me a fairy and a lizard though, so I don't trust it too much..." I said, smiled and scratched the back of my head, stared at the sky.

"Southerners are fond of name-calling. The Northerners did that too sometimes, but... I guess it's different. Have you ever been called a fairy?" I asked, focused on the boy, and he chuckled.

"A fairy is another name for a Fairy Tail mage, so yeah. As of Lizard... some people call me Salamander, apparently. Now come on, it's kind of late, and we're getting up early tomorrow!" he grabbed my hand at that, started walking again. It was dark, and stars lit up the sky, showing me the constellations I used to be so fond of as a child. Still was for that matter. So Fairy Tail mages were called fairies. I guess that made sense. That meant the guys that tried to beat me up weren't too fond of my family. How strange... Fairy Tail consisted of some of the nicest people I had ever met.

"Natsu?" I questioned.

"Hm?" he said, urging me to continue.

"Where IS Igneel?" I asked. I had been wondering for some time, since I hadn't seen any dragons around.

"..." silence. He let go of my hand.

"I don't know..." he muttered after a while, stared at the sky as we continued walking, his hands moving up and resting at the back of his head.

"Oh..." what else could I say. Igneel was missing. The pessimistic part of my brain pronounced him dead, but.. Igneel was a DRAGON. Like a REAL one. Dragons didn't just die off the bat.

"But you're looking for him, right?" I continued.

"Yeah." he confirmed.

"That's good," I said. We were outside the house now, and once more stopped as he turned to me. Even in the dark I could see his conflicted look, telling me that the boy didn't really feel comfortable talking about this. I felt obligated to keep talking, give him a reason why I felt it was good that he was looking for the being he clearly saw as his father.

"You seem lucky. If anyone can find Igneel, you can." I said, seriously. When he just stood there I passed him, entered the house I had been in before. Like it was two weeks ago, messy and kind of smelly. It still bore that aura of being a home.

"Aren't you looking for him? He's your dad too, isn't he?" he asked as he followed me, closed the door behind him. And now.. he had wandered on to a genre I found rather unpleasant. Not many things bothered me, I used to find things odd rather that bothersome.

"I don't think Mama would like that." I chose the simple answer. She truly would be irked if I sought the being she claimed to be my dad out. Mad even. And when she was mad..

"Why?" Natsu asked.

"Dunno," I replied, dragged the t-shirt over my head, revealing once more he bandage that kept me decent.

"What are you doing?" he suddenly asked. I turned to look at him. He bore an odd expression. Happy had in the meantime already gone to bed.. when did THAT happen?

"The shirt stinks. Don't worry, I'll go and wash it tomorrow." I replied, tossed the shirt to the ground and went to the fireplace, once more blew some fire on the blocks of wood readily waiting. Was it Natsu that readied the fireplace every day, or was it Happy?

"You know, if you want to you can borrow the shower." Natsu commented. I looked up and he pointed towards the extra door while wearing the same expression he wore when he called me weird. That.. would actually be pretty nice.

"How does a shower work?" I asked as I got up from my squatting position and cocked my head to the side. I knew what a shower was, I wasn't an idiot... I just.. hadn't technically used one before.

"Come'ere," he grabbed my arm and dragged me into the small room that was complete with a bathtub with a little shower over it. I stopped dead.

Smoke filled the room, it was almost unbearably hot. In a white bathtub a little girl with black hair sat while screaming in agony. I stood by the door, banging at it, to no avail.

"LET US OUT! PLEASE, SHE'S DYING!" I yelled my voice desperate and pleading at the same time. Fire licked upon the wall, flames filled with so much rage and hatred, I couldn't devour it without causing myself physical pain.

"PLEASE!" I pleaded. Again, nothing. I swallowed, and started eating from the flames again, feeling like burning acid down my throat. Why? Why did it have to happen now? Why couldn't I save my friend that couldn't handle the ever increasing heat?

"MAMA, HOPE IS DYING!" tears streaming down my face, quickly dissolving in the heated air. But no one came.

"You turn on this to turn the water on, and twist this to adjust the heat... Lucy?" I got called back from my flashback by the one and only Natsu Dragneel, my current room-mate, and nodded as I neared him.

"This one turns on the water, this one makes it hot or cold. Got it," I replied while pointing on the ones he had shown me.

"You okay?" he put a hand on my shoulder, and I nearly jumped out of my skin.

"Yeah... I just remembered something. We used to have a bathtub that looked like this before my house burned to the ground. Thanks, Natsu," I said, smiled, and he shrugged, left the bathroom, but not before he sent me another puzzled look. When he left I discarded the rest of my clothes, including the bandages around my chest. Hot water. I had used it before, but usually I would have to heat it myself. Now, that one to adjust the heat.. I turned it, and this one to turn it on.. right?

"Hey, there's some soap over ther.. what is that?" he had entered once more, and I turned around while covering my "assets" with one hand.

"Why you little, OUT!" I yelled the last word, sent a fireball after him. While it could do little damage, it surprised him enough to send him flying out of the room. Before he could recover I shut the door tightly and turned the lock.

Some things even I knew, and boys walking in on girl while they were changing was a big no no. That, and since he had walked in while I had my back turned, he had most certainly seen IT. The ONE thing I disliked sharing with anyone, friend or foe. Not that friends ever had been numerous over the ages. I didn't mind that, silence was usually enough.

"What's that on your back?" I heard the muffled voice from the other side of the door. I didn't want to answer him. I didn't want to recall it. I didn't want to face this today. Therefore I just turned my back to the door again. Had it been open, Natsu would've once more gotten a good view of the massive scars I usually covered with my bandages, scars that spelled out a single word. MONSTER.


	8. MONSTER

I am standing in HIS bathroom, by the door, staring at the bathtub, filled to the brim with blood, a figure standing in it, her hair long and covering her breasts and reaching all the way into the red liquid. Black and slick with more blood. Her eyes are blue, staring widely at me, her mouth opening slowly.

"There is no such thing as freedom." she says in her childish voice, and with that she takes the first step out of the bathtub, blood spilling out on the floor. Then her mouth widens, and she lets out an agonising shriek as her body catches fire.

I heard screaming. It was so far away, but the voice was familiar. My voice. How strange. Then, as my sleep-huddled mind caught up with my body, I found myself in the forest, my breath coming in sobs, even though I wasn't crying. My fists were bloodied, the surrounding area burned to a crisp in almost a perfect circle. Finally. It was gone.

"I need to visit the graveyard again..." I muttered, and slowly got up from my position standing on my knees. *Just kill me*. *There is no such thing as freedom*. Once more I drove my fist into the ground.

"FUCK!" and again. Again. Again.

"Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. FUCK." I swore for each time I hit home, ignoring the searing pain slowly moving up my arm as the strain was making itself known. I am FREE from her. I gave her a FUCKING GRAVE! *There is no such thing as freedom*. My fist stopped centimetres from the ground.

"I know..." I finally whispered. Without another word I got up, started walking in the direction I came from. How I knew what that direction was? Searing footsteps had left their traces, guiding me back.

A while after I encountered Natsu, walking towards me with question marks emanating from his being. I sent him a look to show I knew he was there and continued on my way without a word.

What was I doing here? I had no idea, to be honest. Should've caught on when Natsu mentioned today being a big day. Then, as I entered the guild, I all but got attacked by Mira, dragged off into some closet and told to accompany Gray, Happy, Erza and Natsu on this quest.

Why? No idea. Erza had most certainly not invited me, so why was I still sitting on this bench in front of the train-station, staring at Gray and Natsu as they butted heads and threw insults at each other. It wouldn't be long before Erza arrived, and then they would all of a sudden act like best friends.

"What are you doing here, Lucy?" Happy asked where he sat next to me, echoing my very thoughts.

"Mira asked me to come along," or more like threatened, though no threats actually passed her lips. My instinct just told me I should do as she said.

"Why, we don't need you," he commented, and I nodded thoughtfully while toying with the bandages I had wrapper around my hands. The wounds would heal quickly enough, but I was still sore.

"I know." I answered. Just then Erza arrived, on time, dragging along enough luggage to fill a small house.

"You ready?" she said in a voice that suggested no objections. Together we entered the train, me earning just a slight curious glance from the armoured woman before we all were on our way. This mission might turn out being an interesting one.

"You sure you're okay?" Gray asked me, sent a look towards my bandaged hands.

"Already told you, I used to dig holes for my graves through rock all the time. This time it was a tad deeper than normal, sure, but essentially this is nothing new. My fingers will be fine, eventually." I replied simply. Gray was still eyeing me suspiciously while we walked towards what was hopefully our guild. My sense of direction was limited at best, the others... well, we would survive, but getting back to Magnolia would be.. interesting.

As to my currently somewhat molested hands, we had encountered an issue at a train station a day or two back. A wind user had made something of a cocoon of razor sharp air in order to trap me, Gray, Natsu and Erza there while he went to some guild-meet too pretty much exterminate the guild masters present in Clover Town. While my services had turned out to be rather useless, I did have a certain affinity to digging holes. Making countless graves had given me the skill, and this time around it was much needed.

Of course, digging through concrete was a rather bothersome task, and I scraped my hands pretty badly. Mauled might be a better word than scraped. I'd experienced worse, to be honest, and didn't really get the big deal. It would heal in no time, especially after I fixed some of my disjointed limbs. Jeez. Big deal. Weird southerners.

Digging graves in solid mountain had never been a piece of cake either, but it had to be done as my graveyard expanded. Tundra was pretty bad too. I had a shovel to help me at the last spurt, but the blisters had been pretty hardcore even back then. Then came the engravings on the gravestones... I really did need to visit a graveyard soon.

"I'm HUNGRY!" Natsu on his side complained loudly.

"You will bear with it until we get BACK!" Erza countered, and we all wisely ignored her rumbling stomach as we kept walking in the middle of nowhere. This felt strangely like my last mission, wandering about merely hoping for something, anything, to pop up at some point that may give me an inkling as to where the hell I was. If this WAS indeed the same, then.. this would take time.

Home sweet home. Well, Magnolia in any case. What had I learned of my fellow guild mates so far? They need to feed, a lot, and often. That would suffice for Gray, Erza, Master (that had accompanied us after the others broke a town in the process of saving everyone from this strange.. thing), Natsu and Happy.

Sure, I liked eating every so often myself, but there was such a thing as time and place. In the middle of a canyon with not even a plant in sight.. that did not fit the bill. About me, well... Let's just say that I get grumpy after some time without food. After a while I also tend to get violent. Thankfully we found our way back to the city before I was overcome with the urge to knock out a very annoying Dragon Slayer bearing a name I at the moment couldn't be bothered mentioning.

"I'm going to the graveyard. See you guys later," I announced and went ahead through some side street.

"That's not the right way though," Erza protested, but I held up a hand without turning around.

"I don't care, I'll find it eventually." I said, kept on walking. Sense of direction or not, I still needed some much needed silence after almost a week surrounded by people, nonstop.

When the sun set I found myself squatting in front of a grave in the graveyard, covering my face with my hands. I heard steps, and knew the person before he spoke up.

"I thought you said crying was a waste of time," the priest commented, and I had to smile before I took my hands away. My eyes remained dry as I looked up on him.

"Indeed. Tears cannot bring what is lost back to you, no matter how desperate they might be. Besides..." I looked back at the grave. A child was buried here. Five years of age.

"I think I lost my tears. It would seem I am unable to recall how to cry," I replied. I saw the grave, and I could picture a child of that age, yet... I felt no urge to let water flow through my eyes. I felt no soreness in my throat.

The person named on the grave in front of me was dead. End of story. I had never met him. Never would. The woman had been crying in front of this very grave the other day. A waste... if her child saw her, he would be disheartened. I got up and stretched my stiff legs, yawned slightly. Slowly I turned to face the priest. He had a calm face, but also slightly curious.

"What kind of life did you have before you arrived here?" the priest asked me.

"I lived in a village up north, out of Fiore. I might go back there when Mama comes back from hunting, probably won't be long..." I replied. The time when Mama would return was nearing. I might miss the people in Fairy Tail, but.. all things end eventually. My time here would too.

"Until then, though, I do believe I have some work to do here. I might not be done today, but I will at least do something for the people that was." I continued, stretched my body and then went on to the side of the graveyard with the older graves. Not all of them remained attended to these days, so they needed a good makeover. Besides, I needed something to calm my nerves, and this was a good way to do just that.

"It is a strange hobby you have, attending graves belonging to people you never met," the priest was following me, probably to tell me to leave in not too long. Slowly bedtime was nearing, nearing for the both of us.

"Many things are strange, old man. Dying is one of the few things that aren't." I countered.

"I guess that is one way to look at it. I do wish to get home soon though, so..." he said back. And there it was, the request for me to leave.

"I will leave, of course. I do remember the fact that southerners close their graveyards during the night. I merely needed to see this place." I said, stood up from the grave I had been weeding. I could continue in the morrow perhaps. Or mayhap after my hands had returned somewhat back to normalcy. It stung using them.

"What have you done to your hands, girl?" the man asked as we walked side by side towards the gate.

"I attempted to dig in concrete. Not the best idea, but it worked out in the end. Perhaps will be come upon each other in the morrow!" I said simply, smiled and waved before setting off running. Food, exercise, sleep. Those were the things I would like to do today. Perhaps some bandages first? Then I would need to visit the guild, or Natsus home. The guild it was then.

The stars are pretty things. I always liked the stars, liked gazing at them whenever the clouds receded from the night sky. During the winters of the North most of the day also held stars. My steps moved slowly as I with my finger drew the different zodiacs present there. I knew most of them, had always had a thing for the art hidden up there. Leo, Pisces, then Orion. No Zodiac that one, but still...

"Farther, farther, up and down, chase the nasty monster down. Monsters murder, monsters lie, therefore monsters need to die." I stopped dead when I heard the chant performed with a childish melody in contrast to the male voice singing it.

"Up the Mountain Road it lives, on the forest floor it sleeps. If you come upon it once, all your treasure then it keeps," it went on, on to the next verse. Then the next.

"Get your pitchforks, get your guns, get your fire, make it run. Farther farther, all around, hunt the nasty Monster down. Monsters murder, monsters lie, therefore monsters need to die..." the male voice stopped singing at the end, merely spoke the words from the song. I stared at the group in front of me, a good ten guys with wicked grins, carrying with them what seemed to be sledgehammers.

"I got it right, didn't I, that song? You've heard it before, no? Lucy's song? Your song. I have greetings from someone you might know, and he has a message I have been asked to give to you directly..." he said, the singer. His grin widened.

"It has more verses," I commented instead while clenching my fists. I knew what would come now. They laughed, the guys, over my needless piece of information. Then they charged. Here we go again. This was going to hurt lie a bitch.. for all of us.


	9. A Declaration of War?

I considered myself a strong person, but not due to my capabilities when it came to combat. My main strength lay in my ability to endure massive amounts of physical attacks. This didn't mean that I couldn't land some good punches myself, by all means. As things stood though, I never really did learn much about that thing called defence, seeing how it went against the whole face things head on theme I had been raised to live by. And when ten guys attack you with sledgehammers... It hurts. It hurts a LOT. Did I mention it hurts?

It all ended with my unexpected escape. I made a run for it, and it hurt more than just physically at that point. My pride, it suffered greatly. Well, at least I got to use my newly acquired skill, swimming. Saltwater would cleanse my wounds. It hurt, but it would cleanse them. Therefore I endured, though I admittedly had to make port by the guild not too long thereafter in order to avoid passing out while at sea. That would've been a lame way to go.

Slowly I dragged my damaged body up onto the shore by some trees, and managed to sit up against a tree-trunk so I once more could look at the stars by the water edge. Such glory it was, gazing at the never ending mass of water. It made the stars even more beautiful, especially since the still water reflected them making it seem all the more infinite. *Hey, kiddo, remember what I taught you, eh? No sleeping the first hours after a major trauma, makes it one major pain in the neck to wake you up again!*.

"Yeah, yeah... I*cough*know..." I uttered back to my at present imaginative mother that would be standing over me, her eyes scolding. Then she would smile when I answered like that. *Hah! I raised no wimp after all, nor will you ever become one 'cause I won't let you! Remember, if you ever stop fighting to survive you forget HOW to survive!*. I knew exactly how she would be, since she was my greatest idol, the one being I always had admired more than anyone. Strong, vicious and loyal to the bone. And with a very imaginative mind, always speculating on new ways to fight, new ways to survive.

"Why the hell would they do that? Just declare war on us so openly?!" I heard the distinct voice of Gray Fullbuster, and I instantly held back another cough as the sound of his voice brought me back to reality. It might be a good thing, or I might've fallen asleep where I sat in the cool night. The boy was standing in the clearing behind the guild, staring at the sea as I was. What was he on about?

"Dunno, but they did something stupid making us their enemies. Phantom Lord. We're all going to their guild tomorrow to show them why no one messes with Fairy Tail," Natsu replied. So he was there too. Why the sudden crowd this late at night. Shouldn't they be sleeping or something? At least they hadn't noticed me yet.

"Is Levy alright, by the way?" Gray continued to ask after Natsus little rant. Levy? Something happened to that feisty little Blunette I met so briefly that other day? The girl that always was accompanied by those two weird beings, Jet and Droy? Their team was.. Shadowgear, wasn't it?

"She's managing, but got beaten up pretty badly. Jet and Droy too... They'll have to stay in the hospital for a while." Natsu said. Indeed, Jet and Droy. I wasn't mistaken about the names.

"Everyone else is accounted for?" Gray continued asking. Why did they need to be accounted for?

"Everyone but Lucy. Erza is checking the graveyard now." the Fire mage said. And of course.. people looking for me. Just what I needed. I had attempted to keep the mess created after fighting those guys at a minimum, but sooner or later someone probably would come over the guys, and the minor craters in the ground, some made by me, some by them.

"Alone? I thought everyone had to accompany each other," Gray said. Huh? Accompanied? Since when? And why?

"She'll manage. If anyone even TRIES to beat her..." Natsu let that one hang there, and I could see the two of them cringe.

"I feel sorry for everyone attempting that..." Natsu ended. Then the two of them fell into an awkward silence. Attack? Beaten up? Hospital? Phantom Lord? Enemies? But if everyone should be accompanied, then... I ought to find Erza before... I'm not going anywhere, am I? It hurt to move. Nope, didn't think so. Even breathing was a pain in the neck. Ugh, I couldn't just be laying around here either.

"OI, have Lucy been by here?" I heard Erzas distinct voice as she neared the boys, and I saw them shake their heads. Thankfully there was a bush hiding most of my body. Being found now.. might be awkward. It might also hurt my already bruised pride. Running away from a fight, what had become of me? If Mama really was here she would be very disappointed. She would also obliterate the people responsible from the face of Earthland, but she would be disappointed.

"How strange..." Erza muttered to herself.

"Why?" Natsu asked.

"Well... according to the people I asked, she was running towards the guild." she said. Ah, Titania asking questions, always an interesting thing to see. The trick to survival seemed to depend on the ability to answer very quickly under immense mental pressure.

"Maybe she got lost?" Gray suggested.

"Ah..." the unified sigh the three of them let out made me kind of annoyed. Kind of. I didn't get lost THAT often, did I? Or maybe I did... Yeah... Okay, time to get back to the house belonging to one of the three standing there. I needed some bandages I knew I should have laying about at his place. Silently I slipped back into the water, preparing to dive under. I might make it back before him if I hurried. Salt water cleanses. It hurts, but it cleanses. This was going to be one of those long nights, wasn't it?

"Did you hear that?" suddenly I could se the three of them staring in my direction where I at the moment lay half soaked in water. Shit, they didn't hear me, did they? I guess the pink-haired boy DID have a good sense of hearing, yet... I groaned, rather involuntary, but I guess the secret was out already anyways.

"Who goes there? Show yourself!" Erza announced, drawing her sword as she spoke.

"Mind giving me a few minutes? Holy, let go of me you bast.." I began. And then, too late, I recalled the second reason behind my escape from the deep waters. Sharks. Just great. Just..lovely.

"Did she just..?" Gray began.

"It would appear so." Erza continued.

"By a shark?" Gray said.

"Indeed... Natsu, you get her!" Erza ordered, and the Dragon Slayer actually seemed to be preparing to go into the shark-infested water when what appeared to be a mini volcano erupted beneath the surface, efficiently sending a lot of sharks floating. Up from the water a head appeared, slowly moving towards them. As it neared, soon emerging from the water, they all recognised a very battered Lucy as she made her way onto solid ground, crawling and struggling to do even that. She somehow managed to force her body up on two feet.

"Enough. I've had ENOUGH..." she muttered, her voice cracked but clearly annoyed.

"Lucy?" Natsu was staring at her with disbelieving eyes.

"I'm going in for a dri.. WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO THE GUILD?" before them was a very much rampaged guild, pieces of metal sticking out in almost every direction. Well, someone had had a blast...

"Screw this, I'm going back to the house. Need some.. bandages. Ugh, this hurts.. a lot..." then she fell forward, her breathing ragged.

"Lucy!" the three of them turned her around, and she groaned. Her whole body was.. bruised, bleeding, as if hit repeatedly with a very heavy object. That wasn't shark-teeth. Not half of it could be caused by shark teeth.

"Yeah yeah, no sleeping the first hours after major trauma, makes it a major pain in the neck to wake me up..." she muttered, her eyes not focusing properly.

"I don't think... I can move*cough*though. Sorry 'bout that..." she continued.

"What happened?" Erza asked, borderline commanded.

"I got called a few names again. These*cough*weren't southerners though. Northerners. Definitely Northerners. Give me some*cough*hours and I'll be good. Yeah... A few hours," she managed to explain. There was blood coming with her cough, and she closed her eyes, started humming on some childish melody belonging to a song none of them had heard before. Except from that and a small movement that was her breathing she might as well be dead.

By the gods did I have a headache or what. I might've puked too, had it not been for the general lack of food in my system. I wanted fried fish, for some odd reason I couldn't explain. Hmm... food. I needed food, and now. Fine. I sat up suddenly, aware that I didn't sleep on the forest floor. Then... this place wasn't familiar at all. All white and... hospitalish. Gah, they had brought me to such a place... Couldn't say I liked hospitals much, so I might as well do what I did the last time I got submitted, not too long after the end of my village.

I got up silently, looked to both sides.. and made a run for it, out the window. Okay, so the building technically had four stories, and I had, apparently, been stuck on the top floor. The landing was hard, but I managed to get up, started running while some shocked doctors hanging outside the hospital building started yelling after me. Thankfully I had managed to land on some bushes, so I didn't sustain much damage. Merely a few more bruises, considering how the bandages that covered most of my body shielded me against most things called sharp branches and such.

This whole ordeal was followed by a longer long run through Magnolia city dressed as a mummy while I attempted to find out what way would lead me back to Natsus place. It sure took some time, but eventually I found myself at the house that hopefully would hold some garb for me to wear. The way this was going, I would need a clothing shop to keep me decent. My clothing was being ripped apart faster than ever. Had to be a Fairy Tail thing. Had to be. Half of them did seem to walk around half-naked as it was, after all.

Where the hell was everybody? I had considered going to this small pond where there would be a lot of fish just waiting to be caught, but I had decided against it. The fact that I technically couldn't walk straight was a good reason to say no just this once, though the thought of fried fish still intrigued me.

Thus I had made my way towards the guild, only to find it pretty much abandoned. And with "pretty much abandoned".. well.. no one was there. Not a soul. The only things waiting were a few missions and a good stack of alcohol marked with warnings against anyone that might feel tempted to steal it. It meant they would be back, I guess, but exactly WHEN I couldn't tell for certain.

Point was, no cooked food would be found at the guild, and I would not take the chance on home-cooking. That would be risky even on one of my good days, and then there was that issue with my straight walking. I almost managed to do that now, but it required concentration.

"It would seem they left me behind..." I muttered to myself. People tended to do that every now and then. I merely shrugged and decided to wander the city in my newly acquired clothing until I found a good place to eat. There had to be SOME place that might welcome a broke and broken Fairy Tail mage that really wanted food, right? Okay, so my hopes weren't that high, but it couldn't hurt trying. Besides, I might come upon someone I knew. Worst case scenario, I might even just hang out at the graveyard until my guild-mates returned. There still would be multitudes of graves that needed a good weeding, even though I might have some issues doing it properly in my current state.

As I walked through one of the back streets, I sensed the presence of another mage. A Fairy Tail mage, perhaps? Had I not been abandoned then? How surprising if that was the case. Rain started to fall as I turned around to face my fellow mage.

"Drip. Drip. Drop..."


	10. Phantoms and Fairies

"..." I stared at the being. Blue. Blue all over.

"Did you hit your head?" I asked as the being didn't seem to be answering me. The sky had been blue not too long ago, but now.. where did those clouds come from? My instinct should've warned me of the water falling down.

"Drip. Drip. Drop." the sound of the rain mimicked that of the being. What the...

"Happy. What do you want?" I asked, was losing my patience, and this cat.. was acting stranger than normal.

"You were supposed to stay in the hospital until everyone returned." he said then, and I sighed.

"Hospitals don't suit me, and I can walk perfectly.. well," I stated indignantly, a statement not really supported since I had to lean against a wall in order not to fall.

"What are you doing here anyways? Thought you and Natsu kept together like.. always." I continued. That was not an understatement. That cat followed his self-appointed father everywhere like a shadow. Reminded me of Odin in the strangest ways. Odin liked following Mama around too, before he died, that is.

"He gave me an important mission." the furry little thing answered me, bringing me back from the flashback involving a one eyed cat that rarely uttered a sound in comparison to other cats that lived in the village.

"Which is..?" I asked. I would very much want to know what would make the shadow part with his owner while he and the rest of them went.. somewhere, the gods knew where.

"Watching over you." the cat replied. Watching over me?

"Why?" I asked. Again with the pampering. I had survived for the full length of my life, had I not? Without basic survival skills that would've turned out differently. With death, for instance.

"You get lost a lot." the cat explained. As if that would explain everything.

"I do NOT get lost a lot!" I exclaimed in pure indignation. I managed quite fine, thank you very much!

"So where are you now?" the cat asked me, a suspicious tone I couldn't quite recognise at the moment evident in his voice.

"Magnolia." I replied. I wasn't THAT ignorant. Was I..?

"Where in Magnolia?" Happy continued questioning me. And.. ah, he got me didn't he...

"..." I groaned as the blue cat got his point proven. I had no idea where I was.

"Well it's not my fault, Mama never felt the need to teach me how to notice my surroundings beyond things that might slow me in a fight," it was a lame excuse, but still, I spoke the truth. Sort of... Sense of direction and general defence... The two things that probably would be the death of me one day if I didn't learn the basics. But everything has to die eventually. Knowing the means that would end me didn't matter much. That, and those two things bored me. So much effort. The cat stared again. One of those long stares.

"I will personally pluck your whiskers if you continue looking at me like that. Now.. you should know where I can find some fish..." I threatened and then continued on asking. What was it with these people, or rather Fairy Tail mages, that kept stirring up in my dormant emotions? Why did they keep making me angry, annoyed, and at times even happier that I ever thought I would be? And how? And WHY did I still crave fried fish?

"You want fish too? Let's go to the pond, then!" he said, his annoying stare all but forgotten along with seemingly everything mentioned before fish. He was a cat, alright. Just like Odin.

We walked through the town, me still having issues with walking properly, the town being eerily quiet for some odd reason. Where was everyone? Did they really dislike rain this much? Perhaps. They did seem to have a lot against the cold, so...

"Drip. Drip. Drop..."another voice called out, NOT the blue feline this time around. I turned to see a woman dressed all in blue and holding one of those fancy ass umbrellas that finer ladies used to have. The kind that in general didn't work very well with rain, but that looked classy. Yeah... This whole town might be going mental, and coming from me that really said something.

I kept staggering along, my head turned to stare at the odd woman that seemed gloomy and just plain weird. I stumbled since my gaze wasn't glued to the road like it should be, and then decided to let her be. Fish was more important. Heck, FOOD was more important. Still, with my heightened sense of hearing I heard her words even though she had stopped back in the alley mouth with what I would assume to be a companion I hadn't seen since Happy and I kept walking towards what I hoped to be a pond with a LOT of fish.

"Juvia can't find her, Sol." she said, the woman dressed in blue.

"Non non non. We cannot return without her in our custody. This is bad." a male voice replied. Did he have an actual accent? A terrible accent at that, too... And the woman. She smelled like rain. Not a bad smell, I did find rain quite enjoyable, really, but people usually smelled like, well, people. Not just rain.

"Master will be cross if Juvia doesn't find the girl like he requested. Juvia will be punished..." the girl continued. Did the girl address herself in third person? I stopped dead, and turned to look towards the girl again, a strange man standing next to her. Earth. Wet earth. That was the kind of smell he emanated, even all the way over to the place I was standing, which was a fair while away. I blinked.

"Worry not, I am certain the girl is in the area. Lucy will be found, as Master requested." I froze. Lucy. That was me. And Master. Master wanted me gone? He wanted me found? I had never seen these people before, so they might be from another guild. Requested to take me away. But... if Master wanted me gone, then he could've just told me so. He was too kind... That man. He wanted me to go, but lacked the will to tell me in person.

"Lucy, the pond is this way. Lucy?" I turned to the cat again, the cat that tried to make contact with me again.

"Why are you crying, Lucy? Are you hurt? Are you so hungry that it hurts? I have a fish here if you want it before we get to th.." the cat started rambling, and I noticed the wet flowing down my face that was NOT rain.

"Southerners are too kind." I said, fell to my knees, tears falling freely as I felt all strength leave me. Southerners are too kind. They are so kind, it hurts. This is why feelings are such a hassle. This is why I locked them all away. This is why... my head snapped up, I scuffled up on my feet again.

"You should go for a walk, cat." I said, my voice firm as the powerlessness left it completely.

"Lucy? What's wrong?" the cat asked once more, sounding confused.

"I said... you should go for a walk. I have urgent business to attend to." I restated. The cat was confused. Of course he was confused. He just saw me break down in tears, then suddenly go all strictly business. He was a cat. He didn't hear.. the insult. He didn't hear.. anything. Master might want me to leave. He may have sent these beings that I didn't know in order to make it easier on anyone. No one stayed for long anyways. They usually left at some point.

Everything dies. Everyone leaves. Those two statements held hands more oft than not in my life. That did NOT, however, mean that I would openly accept ANYONE referring to them as trash. They might've lied, but they stuck with me longer than I ever would've expected. They even sent me to a hospital when I got injured. Though I didn't enjoy hospitals, I could appreciate the gesture. And if he wanted me to leave... If everyone wanted me to leave, then so be it. I would go with a bang.

"Sorry 'bout this, Happy..." I mumbled, and before the cat got the time to come up with any ideas as to the reason behind my fluctuant mood-swings I grabbed his tail, swung the creature around above my head and sent him flying as a star in the distance. That would keep him away for a while, and make their dismissal more morally acceptable to them. Weird southern customs. Hating me had to have another reason than my existence alone. Then I turned to stare at the culprits, that had noticed my first class toss of the poor creature that had done less than nothing to deserve it.

"Yo." I greeted the two, and the woman started slowly walking towards me. She had a gloomy look on her face and kept repeating the sound of the falling rain.

"Drip. Drip. Drop." she chanted again. Was it some kind of mantra people used in the south? Perhaps I should note that for myself. Wasn't like I would leave Fiore only because the mages of Magnolia had grown tired of my presence. Knowing local customs might come in handy when encountering others, people than might be less hospitable towards total strangers. I doubted that I would ever meet anyone as kind as the mages of Fairy Tail after all.

"So, who are you?" I asked, tried stalling. Why was I stalling? Who knew...

"We are Juvia of the Deep, the Rain woman," the girl was kind enough to reply, and I nodded. Juvia of the Deep. I had never heard of her, though that did not mean she was not known. There were a lot of people I didn't know, both famous and less famous.

"Nice to meet you, Juvia. I'm Lucy. Fairy Trash." I replied cooly, and with that I set off, leaving a small crater after my sudden and powerful acceleration. Might as well go with a bang, right?

"Boom," I uttered right before my fist made contact with her face.

MEANWHILE

Chaos. If the battleground was to be described with a single word, that would be it. Chaos. Magic flying in every direction, shouts from both sides, pulsing like a living thing as the winning odds kept moving from one side to the other. Fairy Tail versus Phantom Lord. The clash between the two had been pending for a while now, with them being the two top guilds in the whole of Fiore, yet bitter enemies. The masters had never really been friends after all, and with good reason. One sought happiness for its members, the other fortune. While the terms could go for the same in certain situations they remained radically different.

Right now the ground remained a fighting mass of magic circles, beams, shots, punches and kicks while above.. Above was the fight between the Salamander and Iron Gajeel, both of them Dragon Slayers. It had been going on for a while, the two of them still testing each other out, but Natsu slowly letting his anger fire him up.

A crash, and something came crashing down from the roof, hitting the floor with a big bang, creating panic down below as people moved to see what, or who, had fallen from the room where the Masters were supposed to be fighting. Then, suddenly the older Dragon Slayer managed to hit the Salamander to the ground, standing up above as if the difference in hight made him superior. A man appeared next to him, a man with blinds covering his eyes.

"You got her?" Gajeel asked, staring down at the scarfed boy, his eyes amused as he knew that the fellow Dragon Slayer could hear him even through the noise. Natsu stood up, ready to continue the battle but also curious as to what this metal-freak was talking about. Erza was yelling retreat in the background, but the pink-haired idiot ignored it. Like hell he was retreating NOW. Not EVER.

"Such SADNESS! She fought so hard, yet there was nothing she could do!" the blinded man yelled out in a solemn voice, almost as if what he said really did sadden him, though there was something sinister about him. Something sinister that suggested the glee of victory even as tears spilled out from under the folds hiding his eyes away.

"Come on, Natsu! We are falling back!" Erza yelled again, desperate, angry, and sort of scared. The boy didn't know WHEN he knew the falling object to be old gramps, but he knew that he had known for a while. He could feel the anger that was building up in him. Like hell he was giving up on the fight now. Not when there was so much more he had to fight for now.

"NO, like HELL we are!" he uttered his thoughts, and she begged him. Actually BEGGED him. The great Titania. Now that was one of the most scary things he ever had experienced. So he obliged. Reluctantly. He did, however, catch that last phrase that messed up with that newfound determination.

"So Lucy has been taken care of..." Gajeel stated matter-of-factly, and Natsu turned around in an instant to look up at the other male. That smile. That grin as the Iron Dragon Slayer stopped to smirk at the Fire Dragon Slayer before disappearing. Lucy. As in...


	11. Kidnapped

Sky cell. A cage where gravity works against you. I sat on the edge, my legs dangling freely. I didn't really enjoy the view. Mountains. Why enjoy it anyways? What did I have? Since when would the loss of friends ever get to me like this? Since Fairy Tail, apparently. Since I got accepted into a group of strangers as if I was family even with all the things that would usually alienate me from everyone. I had a thing for death, for starters. I wore a lot of black. I could take a lot of damage without seemingly caring. I possessed strength that rivalled that of many grown men.

"You are certain you do not wish to take my offer of nicer accommodation?" I heard a slick voice coming from the other side of a door leading out from this prison ask me.

"Yes." I replied without looking away from the so called view. Wasn't like I could see the guy even if I did turn around.

"May I ask you why?" the voice asked further, and I grimaced, though of course he wouldn't see that either.

"You called them trash." I replied stiffly, and the man sighed heavily on the other side. I dared him to enter this room. I dared him to so much as open the door, and I would have at him again. Even if he could beat me easily, bound as I was, with magic-restricting rope no less.

"Who, Fairy Tail? They are trash. Rude, unsophisticated trash with no sense of decency." he said in a voice as if he tried to reason with me.

"I dare you to come into this room and repeat your words." I said with acid practically dripping from my words. Finally I turned, sent a poisonous glare towards the door, silently willing it to open so I could attack.

"I do not wish to hurt you, but unless you stop behaving like this I might have to." that voice belonging the leader of Phantom Lord continued. Threatening, slick and creepy. I didn't like him. His case wasn't improved when he bound me by my hands and secured me to the wall with magic constricting rope. There was no escape as of yet, not even through this wide opening I sat in. The rope would merely cause my arms to dislocate since they were behind my back, and I would remain hanging far above the ground.

"Maybe I wish to die." I stated simply and stared back out on the plains. Maybe I truly did. Feelings. I knew, that at this moment, Fairy Tail was butting heads with Phantom Lord. They were strong, Natsu, Gray, Erza and the others. I hoped that girl, Levy, would heal soon. She had smiled so sweetly at me the first time we met. I had a name. They might bury me, if they ever found my body. Might be best that they didn't, on the other hand. This leader of Phantom Lord... he wouldn't kill me quickly. Why he kept me here also remained a mystery. Would it not be sufficient to remove me from Magnolia? Wasn't that what Master wanted?

"That is a lie." he replied, and I heard his footsteps retract as he was leaving again.

"Yes it is." I agreed softly, my eyes starting to become all watery again. I hated crying. I never saw the use of it, and I didn't use to be able to before today. Not since... a very long time ago.

"By the way, Lucy. Your Father says hi!" I heard the yell from down the hall, and my eyes dried instantly. My.. Father. As in Father? That couldn't be. Could it? If HE stood in the shadows of this ordeal... If HE had been the true Mastermind, then.. everything changed. Fine. Time to find out just how durable this rope was, or rather, the wall the rope was tied to. Sure, it was magic constricting. Getting my hands loose without gaining strength from a momentum was a good as impossible. I still remained somewhat strong, however. My strength wasn't all magical.

Father, huh. That also explained why my wounds had been tended to, and why the leader of Phantom Lord had been so kind to offer me nicer accommodation than this airy and cold stone cage. Sky cell, where gravity works against you. It could be used as well, though. Used to make my own weight matter, used to level up my strength a few notches.

Of course... I would admit, throwing myself out of the building might seem like a good idea when trying to rip the rope from the wall, witch DID work by the way, but I didn't exactly magically stop falling when I had gained my freedom, and there was a fair distance to the ground. As in, a possibly fatal distance.

Okay, thread body through the hole created by bound hands in order to move mentioned bound hands forward. Chew like hell. Come on come on come on come on. Shit, not going to make it. I'm not going to make it and I'm going to die squished like a pancake on that rocky ground. Would this be the end? No. I refused to accept it, I refused to stop fighting. I refuse. I refuse. Come on, rope, just SNAP ALREADY. Fuck, too la..

"LUCY!" my brain picked up that large shout right before something, or rather someONE crashed into me moments before I landed head first into the ground. That same someone also took the blow of that wall we crashed into the moment after. I was baffled. Absolutely flabbergasted. Just seconds ago I had been angrily denying my impending death while being aware of it coming at me anyways. The next, I wasn't dead. I wasn't even injured by my fall. And secondly, the one to save me was none other than Natsu Dragneel. What on EARTHLAND was HE doing here?

"Jeez, you're crazy.." he muttered where he lay somewhere beneath me, and I had at least the decency to move away, only to continue chewing on my rope. Tough rope, this. When I didn't reply he sighed, sat up and grabbed my hands, untied them.

Ah, the sweet freedom. Not that it would last long though. Natsu was sitting beside me, eyeing me while I stared at him with distrust in my eyes. Who could blame me, I saw no reason for him to be here. He was a nice person, but his guild did not wish for my presence. And Father. *Your Father says hi!*. There was that too.

But the boy didn't need my resentment. The way the world repelled from me was my fault, and my fault alone. Hatred would cause nothing but grief. I needed to go somewhere far off, and then I needed to hit something. Rocks, trees, I didn't care. But not people. I didn't wish to hurt anyone. I wished for the world to just leave me alone.

"Why are you here?" I found myself asking. My hands remained in my lap, trembling. I need to get away. I need to run. I can stay no longer.

"To save you, DUH. And to beat the crap out of the people in this guild for messing with Fairy Tail." he replied, got up, pumped his fist in the air to emphasise his point. Oh, so that was the case. The revenge over Phantom Lord hadn't yet come to pass.

"Master didn't tell you?" I continued asking. Get up Lucy. No need for needless questions. Just get up and leave. You are already rejected. There is no need for you to remain polite. But I wanted to. This boy was nice. Annoying, perhaps a bit stupid at times.. but ultimately, he was nice.

"Tell me what?" he asked. And to top it all off, he didn't know. Or he didn't want to tell me that he knew. I suspected the first option, since this boy wasn't one to use lies, whether it would help him or not. And he was a bad liar too.

"I.. I quit the guild."I lied. There it was. A lie to cover up the truth. But he might take my removal the wrong way. Even if he did indeed pretend to even remotely like me, he may take the action of removing me as a member by force the wrong way. Natsu was like that. All justified and in need of needless explanations.

It was best alienating myself like this. By doing so it would be easier on everyone. Besides, if they believed me to be not caring, Father would cause less harm. Father had done this to hurt me the only way he knew how. I didn't look Natsu in the eyes as I uttered those words, kept my gaze fixed on the ground while I got up on my feet. My hands kept clutching my worn black t-shirt to stop the shaking. I need to go. I need to run.

"You're lying." and again, he saw through my lies so easily. Was I such a bad liar? Amazing how everybody just called me a liar. Perhaps that was another of those unknown customs I knew less than little about. Like calling people names. And making sounds when it rained.

"Am not!" I protested and did the mistake of looking into his eyes. He was SO sure. He KNEW I was lying.

"You are." he repeated. It didn't matter. Lies or no lies. I needed to go.

"I need to go." I stated again, though oddly, I didn't move to support my own statement.

"Where? To kick these peoples asses, 'cause I'm totally in on that." Natsu said, probably picking up on the part that I wasn't leaving. And why wasn't I? Why wasn't I leaving? I ought to be. I needed to find another place to be.

"Already did that, kind of, and NO, I have places to be." I replied, looked up at the sky cell. No one was staying up there yet. No one knew I had escaped. My knees were buckling.

"Lucy... are you SCARED?" he asked, and I looked back at him, Natsu, managed a shaky laugh.

"Terrified, actually. I just found out why Phantom Lord attacked Fairy Tail, other than apparent hatred or odd Southern customs. Not sure which." I said, dragged a hand through my hair, swallowed what might actually be tears. There was no point in hiding my fear. He would see it.

"What?" a short, concise answer.

"I don't know the customs of Southerners, okay? Haven't really stayed here that long, and I'm no good with customs..." I replied. I never was good with customs, for that matter. People often acted strangely, liked saying one thing and doing another. I didn't mingle much, and therefore never got the hang of their actions.

"No, not that, and it isn't a custom, by the way. Why did Phantom Lord attack Fairy Tail?" he asked with urgency, and I looked at him. Really looked. Tried making my shaking hands stop shaking.

"Father wants me back." I said, took a deep breath to avoid a panic attack. Why would Father want me back? After so long, why NOW? This kind of behaviour was right up his alley though. I didn't need to know anything else than his greeting to know that Father had paid the man with the slick voice to ruin everything that might keep me from returning. Especially if he wanted me to return. No way would he associate with such a foul man otherwise.

"Wait. Your dad... As in IGNEEL?" he seemed to be having difficulties accepting that as a truth. I could understand why, if he thought I was talking about Igneel. And why would Igneel just suddenly choose to come looking for me anyways? And why order a guild to fetch me? Of course, Master had sent people to toss me out too, but they had worked double, it would seem. For both Master AND Phantom Lord.

"No, not my dad. Father. They're different people. Completely different people according to Mama. Doesn't matter. I'm not a member of Fairy Tail anymore." I explained, and then restated my lie. I NEEDED him to let me go, or I might not be able to. At least something within me told me that.

"Yes you are, in case you haven't noticed. You still have your mark." Natsu said, pointed at my hand, where it indeed remained still, that pink insignia of mine, yet another thing that would remind me of what I used to be a part of. But honouring what was.. that was something I was good at. I sighed. Perhaps lies didn't work against this person. There was something that would. Or at least I hoped it would.

"Master would disagree with you." I said. The truth. Master did not want me around.

"No he wouldn't." Natsu retorted, speaking with a tone that suggested him to believe the very notion to be preposterous. At least I thought his tone suggested it. Or he just found it silly. Yeah. That was more logic. So he needed more convincing. I started rambling just about then.

"He sent mages to escort me out of Magnolia. I know I'm not the best of company, and I'm not good with customs, but he could've told me, you know. I would've left. I would've accept.." a fist interrupted my speech, sending me to the ground and a while further. I sat up, touched my jaw where his fist had landed. Kind of sore. Not that I wasn't used to it, but he usually gave me a warning before attacking me.

"Don't you DARE insult Old Gramps like that." Natsu said cooly. Insult him?

"What do you mean, insult?" I asked. I wouldn't insult that old man even if it killed me. He was one of the nicest, really tiny old men I had encountered in my life. He had welcomed me into his guild while performing a smile, and even asked me a couple of times how I was doing. Who did that?

"You said he sent people to escort you out of Magnolia." Natsu said, his eyes serious and burning with anger.

"He did." I confirmed.

"He DIDN'T." he denied fiercely once more, seemingly getting ready to punch me again.

"He's called Master, isn't he?" I asked. I was pretty sure the old man was called Master.

"Yes, but.." he confirmed, was about to continue when I interrupted him. I wasn't finished with my reasoning.

"The mages said Master ordered them to take me." I said. This made him stop in his stance, look at me oddly. He even lowered his fists. What did I say? Had he finally seen my reasoning?

"Wait. They said Master. Only Master?" he asked, his brows furrowed.

"Yes." I confirmed. Then Natsu sighed, dragged a hand through his hair.

"Lucy.. all guilds have Masters. Since we're Fairy Tail members Old Gramps is OUR guild master. Unless they said Master Makarov they were talking about THEIR guild master." he explained.

"What?" I said. All guilds had a person they called Master? Natsu sighed again, the last ounce of rage leaving him.

"Come'ere" he said then, offered me a hand to get up. I just looked at it for a moment before I looked back at him again.

"So he doesn't want me gone?" I had to be sure. I didn't want it to be a lie, but wanting it to be true didn't necessarily MAKE it true.

"'Course not. You're family. Now come on," he said, urged me on, still offering me that hand.

"You're not lying?" I asked in a thin voice, and I felt tears threatening to spill again.

"No. Why would you even think that?" he asked, and with that, I finally broke down in tears. Again. Everything was just too confusing. Everything was just too.. too overwhelming. I wasn't banished. And Father was coming for me.

"Ah, don't cry. Come on, it's going to be alright. We'll go back to the guild. Probably a good idea..."he said, clearly highly uncomfortable with me crying, though I held no ability to stop it at the moment. In fact, I started to sob when he said that, and he became even more flustered with his words. In the end he merely hauled me up on his back and started walking. So much for my stoic appearance. So much for my so called acceptance over the fact that people liked leaving in the end.

So I might want to stay. More than anything I had wanted in a very long time. Now only one issue remained. One hell of an issue too. Father. And the mystery remained. Why would he want anything to do with me?


	12. May as well go out with a...

It was in the basement of the Fairy Tail guild, filled with people drinking their pain away. Emotional pain after the shock of seeing their master being literally beat to the ground, now being healed by a childhood friend without any promise of recovery. Physical pain in the shape of cuts, bruises and broken limbs. Now normal people might call this a broken guild, but that was far from the case.

Even with the angst around their fallen Master and their stinging wounds hope remained vibrant, people chatting away, laughing and making jokes. There were many damaged souls in this guild, souls that sought the company of others, and found it here. Their Master was their Father, their Barmaid a mother. The rest were like sisters and brothers, watching out for each other, protecting each other. One would have to look far and wide to find a family just like this.

A fight was breaking out amongst some of the younger people, but excluded two of the regulars that at the moment were busy verbally assaulting each other in the corner of the guild. Both of them belonged to what was referred to as the strongest team in Fairy Tail. Why they were verbally rather than physically assaulting each other? Because Erza Scarlet was sitting nearby, a little too close for comfort should they actually lash out at each other, but preoccupied enough for them to argue without risking sudden death. She was sitting by the corner, next to a now thankfully sleeping Lucy.

They had all been briefed on the matter of this Father that wanted her back. That was also everything they could get out of the girl. A man that Lucy, the girl that didn't even fear death seemed terrified of.

There was also that unresolved matter of what happened before she was brought here. She had obviously been crying, which was odd in itself, but she also started laughing when the people from the guild greeted the two returning. A really nice sounding laughter, one they didn't remember hearing before. After the moment was over though she got off the back of Natsu and crawled to a corner where she closed her eyes and remained.

"Titania?" I muttered, remembering one of the names belonging to the woman that called herself Erza Scarlet. I didn't open my eyes, but I could feel her sitting next to me. I also felt her jumping slightly since she obviously thought I'd been asleep.

"You're awake." not a question. She was like that, the red-haired mage. Always direct, firm and proper. And at times, very violent. Not that I judged her for it, it made her who she was.

"Sorry for the damage I caused on the town..." I muttered, remembering briefly the burning buildings, the holes in the ground and walls, that collapsed bridge. The remnants after my fight with those people from the North.

"Sorry for the mess with that guild too. Sorry for the things with Master. And the other guild-members. Sorry for everything." I opened my eyes at that last statement, stared straight at the woman that was sitting there. Such pretty, long hair. Such a pretty colour. I noticed Gray and Natsu that also stopped yelling in order to look at me.

"I know the rivalry between the two guilds. That strange person with the abilities of earth told me. You are.. enemies, of sorts. And the leader of Phantom Lord. He wants to obliterate this guild. I gave him one on the nose for it, but it didn't break. Sorry about that too. He did one mistake, that Phantom man. After.." I stopped myself. Attempting to break his nose he hadn't exactly made the man happy with me. The details of that particular after were not necessary for these people to hear. The after after the after however, THAT was relevant.

"He fixed me up. Probably thought Father wanted to see me proper." I said, briefly changing my statement so it held only what they needed to know. As if Father would care. He could probably fix me up nicely himself if he found the need to do so. He had a lot of adequate doctors in his service of memory served me right.

"Who is he?" Erza asked again. She had asked me when I got back, but I hadn't answered. Hadn't wanted to. I guess the identity was on the list of things that these people needed to know. They were partly fighting against him, after all, since he HAD hired the guild responsible for the mess made. Master was injured because of me, and these people too. Fairy Tail. So I sighed.

"You might've heard of him... Not like I tried keeping it secret or anything... His name is Jude Heartfilia." I replied her, finally. I didn't like saying HIS name. It felt like uttering it might somehow summon him here, to this very room, and I didn't like the possibility of any such thing happening.

"Heartfilia. As in THE Heartfilia? Owner of Heartfilia Konzern Heartfilia?" Gray questioned, wide eyed, and I blinked.

"I don't know what he owns. Never asked. He has a lot of money, enough to pay a guild to hunt me down and fetch me back. Not that I know WHY..." I replied, and got up, stretched my body. They had done a good job patching me up, my wounds had been nicely cleaned and pertly healed with some kind of ointment.

Sure, I still had a few broken bones, but it wasn't something I couldn't handle.

"So you're rich?" Gray said, stared at me. Rich? As in wealthy? Perhaps. There was a time of balls and frilly dresses. Not that I wished to venture into that particular part of the past. I didn't really want to venture too far into any part of my past. The present worked just fine. Better than fine, really.

"One way of putting it. I'm not..." I started, but I was interrupted as the ground started shaking, and we all looked up. What the..?

We arrived outside the remnants of the guild, metal still sticking out in various directions, Only to gape at the sight awaiting us on the ocean. The phantom lord building, yes, the BUILDING, was moving on what seemed to be giant legs through the water.

I stood there, staring at the object of interest, the one containing those that had insulted these people and that threatened to obliterate them. And then closed my eyes. Concentrate. Gather it all. Protect what is most important. I felt tears prickling up in my face, but ignored them. THIS.. would not end with the end of Fairy Tail.

He spoke of surrender. He spoke of the futility in the word. That nothing would stop him, and that they should just give up their comrade and get this business over with. Had he not heard of Fairy Tail before?

They gave him a reply all in the guild knew to be the right one. The hell they would. In their midst, there she stood, the blonde, her eyes closed and her fists clenched. Tears flowed down her face. She was a Fairy Tail mage, as much as everyone else. Then emerged the cannon, and a voice told them that this would be the end of the town called Magnolia...

FLASHBACK

I ran. I ran because I knew I couldn't fight these people. Then the grown ups would be mad. The old woman at the cloth store. The old man that worked at the bakery. And if they got mad, they might be the next to chase me.

Once a human and a beast, gathered up and had a feast. From them there was born a child, a demon with its eyes so wild.

Human eyes and human skin, it resembled not its kin. Blood it craved and blood it shed, until we painted its back red.

Up the mountain road we went, all our guns and pitchforks spent. Marked the child of curses red, until its back its true name bled.

They held me down. They held me down, and they used a rusty knife to carve it upon my back. My true name. I had been so happy earlier that day. The children in the village had asked me to come play with them. They were older than me, which made it even more prestigious. I was a child. No more than five or six years old, the one that invited me maybe ten or twelve. Children. Innocent children as adults would call them.

I Shrieked while they used the old weapon, probably a hand me down, not really that sharp anymore, which made it all that more painful. While they did it they sang that song. An old song, they called it, but they said it was mine now. I would be given my true name. The words might not fit in a child's mouth, some would say. I said it fitted nicely. Why, the children sang it quite often.

Skin it flay it, mark it slay it, hang it hit it, we must kick it. Human heater, crier shrieker, bleeder bested, limits tested

Hang it up and slit its throat, let it hang like slaughtered goat. Blood will leave it nice and slow, like monsters butchered long ago

Farther farther up and down, chase the nasty monster down. Monsters murder monsters lie, we will make the monster die

Then they found a rope, bound my hands and legs, started dragging me along to a tree where one of them climbed up, and I realised what they were about to do as their song progressed. My back ached, a feeling intensified when I got dragged along the forest floor. I kept screaming for them to stop. No one listened. No one ever listened.

The song continued, passing their lips and following that same, simple melody. Some of them had blood on their faces, some of them had hands soaked in it. Of course they didn't react. This was a small village, most of them had been taught to hunt from a young age. They'd been taught to stay away from me too, the child of the mountain woman. The Dragon lady.

Dragon lore she taught us well, beastly was the strength she held. But monster mother could not lie, the destiny is it must die

Farther farther up and down, shoot it dead or let it drown. Monsters murder, monsters lie, therefore monsters need to die

One verse kept recurring. Monsters murders, monsters lie. Lies. I tried promising never to lie again, but they ignored me as they strung me up in the tree by my feet, making the blood rush to my head, making hard to think.

Hang it up and slit its throat, let it hang like slaughtered goat. Blood will leave it nice and slow, like monsters butchered long ago

Farther farther up and down, chase the nasty monster down. Monsters murder monsters lie, we will make the monster die.

One of them stepped forward, held that same rusty knife they had used earlier, walking up to me. No. Don't. PLEASE. Let me.. go. He had brown eyes, the boy. Like me. Black hair, all curly and sort of short. I knew him to be the son of the village butcher, though I didn't know his name. I never was good with names.

He wasn't their only child, the youngest boy of three. He had a younger sister, though, a cute thing with long, curly hair and dark, brown eyes. Large eyes, and always a smile. She had smiled at me too, didn't think I was a freak. She was young, so she didn't call me names. Not yet. But she would. With time, they all did. And they started singing the song of Beasts. Or like they said in my village, Lucy's song. The boy stepped closer and closer, a serious look on his face. I tried promising not to speak to his sister again, but he didn't listen.

Hang it up and slit its throat, let it hang like slaughtered goat. Blood will leave it nice and slow, like monsters butchered long ago

He chanted lowly, put the rusty knife against my throat, cool metal against skin. I screamed in terror, and finally the blood rushing to my head seemed to seal off the part of me that contained reasonable thoughts. I snapped. I snapped, and felt the heat surround me, engulfing the tree in seconds and making the children step back in terror. The rope was incinerated immediately, and I turned in the air, landed on my feet, roared in agony, the sound alone making the ground shake.

FLASHBACK END

The cannon was directed at the guild called Fairy Tail, and the town called Magnolia. It was the only place I had ever heard of other than the village. Fairy Tail was the only Magic Guild in the town. A place where mages could gather up and take on jobs in order to earn money.

Fairy Tail was known for many things. Destructive tendencies and camaraderie high on that list. I opened my eyes to see Erza Scarlet don what I suspected to be one of her stronger armours, if not THE strongest. I saw the beam directed at her. At us. The guy pulling the strings had called this guild trash. Unsophisticated trash. They never threw rocks at me. They never called me a monster. They never tried to string me up in a tree in order to slit my throat and watch me bleed out. They never told me to die.

A roar penetrated the air, made it vibrate with the ground, making some of the mages fall to their knees while clutching their ears in an attempt to close the noise out. I saw Natsu turn around, stiffen when he saw my figure, right as the ground around me cracked when I started releasing the pressure built up within me. I saw his lips utter my name, though the vibration of my magic kept out all sounds before I charged, right before the beam of destruction was released from the cannon, heading for the scarlet mage. She put her shield up, a major magic circle appearing in front of her. Run.. faster. Faster. FASTER!

She was prepared for this. She would protect the guild in the place of Master, until he returned. It was her responsibility to do so. Titania stood firm, wearing her Rune Armour, ready for the assault that would ruin everything should she ever move. She had heard the roar, felt the shaking ground, but did not waver as she moved her shield in front of her, creating the best defence she could muster.

It all happened very fast. The beam was released. Titania steeled herself. Then, light as a feather, something touched her shoulder. It threw her enough off guard to turn her head, and she saw what she believed to be Lucy. It was her foot that touched her right before she passed, her eyes fixed on the beam. At least Erza thought so. Though it might somewhat resemble the girl, it almost was like a different person. Skin partly covered by red scales, her nails transformed into razor sharp claws. Her eyes black as night and her teeth, sharp and white, displayed in a terrifying sneer. Then she had passed, and light surrounded her as she disappeared into the beam that had enough strength to wipe out a town.

It is my destiny to die young. It is my destiny to die as a monster. Might as well go with a bang...


	13. BANG!

My mother is Layla Clive, the toughest woman you would ever get to meet. My dad is Igneel, a dragon. Fierce, strong, brave. Stupid. Not that I ever met Papa, he has been off limits since the day off my birth. So I am the child of the beauty and the beast, an abomination that never should have come into existence, yet here I am. The Cursed Child.

I roared when I felt the transformation take hold of me, rippling off of me in waves of magical power, creating blasts of air that ripped in the hair of those that stood near, and even brought those unsuspecting to their very knees. It was almost crippling, the pain following this. My body was not really built to sustain this kind of energy, though my genes allowed me to survive it, at a cost, of course. If I lived to see the end of this, the repercussions would be.. interesting.

I had already taken off when my foot lightly touched her shoulder, a short warning that allowed the strongest female in this guild to see the image of me before I headed into what might become my death. I wanted her to see, because then she would know what I was, and thus the mourning would cease. Most people did not mourn monsters.

I hit the beam, felt the surge envelope me as I countered it with the very force of my being. And, as I had anticipated, I also felt it breaking some of my already fractured ribs. Still, I prevailed, brought my flaming fist forward until it hit solid metal.

There was a large sound, then it gave in, right in front of me, that very large and solid piece of metal. It uttered strange sounds as it twisted and contorted under the immense heat and pressure that combined served to pack it together into a nearly unrecognisable lump of metal that would not shoot anything anytime soon.

Upon impact I think most of the bones in my arm gave in, but the magic kept it from merely exploding into a bloody mess of human meat, kept keeping my body in check like I knew it would. I landed on the grey chunk of ruined metal, looked around briefly, looking for all things that might threaten my family. The next thing I knew, something metal rammed into my stomach, fractured more ribs, sending me crashing into some rubble in the castle, through some walls or roofs or SOMETHING and into some room with a giant lacrima, efficiently breaking it into thousands of tiny and not so tiny shards.

"Something tells me daddy dearest didn't tell us everything about his lovely lost daughter..." a voice called out, and I saw a man appeared. Long black hair, his face covered in metal studs. He smelled like Dragon so I understood what he had to be. Dragon Slayer, like Natsu. I growled at him as I got up, pieces of glass having ripped through skin and created flesh wounds wherever my scales did not protect me. I would.. defeat him.

"Like the fact that you aren't a Celestial mage at all." he added, and I charged, felt the ground give in under me due to the force of my acceleration once more. My fist hit air as he dodged me, hit me in the ribs again. Sending me into the shard-infested ground, and I felt one of the not so little shards enter deeply into my back. Staying conscious was.. hard. But I would not go down yet. Fight things head on. There was no time for remorse. No time for retreat. No time for fear. I roared as I got back up on my feet, set my eyes on my target.

By now I had already started bleeding through my eyes, bloody tears griming up my face, though I doubted it would do me much good. I had chosen this fight. Time to fight it. Concentrate. Use what you know.

"Dragons WINGS!" I yelled with a hoarse voice, hoarse since my lungs were slowly filling with liquid or just failing altogether. Flaming wings appeared on my back, I coughed blood, but charged again, roared in pain and anger. He jumped up high, and I flew up using my wings, feeling my innards churn within, slowly starting to fail. My magic was in my blood. It was part of me. Yet.. though my mother had taught me to use it, she had never taught me how to lessen the strain. The strain that came with using magic that did not comply with just any human body. I still used it the way I had seen it being used by HER, moved my wings as if they were in fact a part of me.

Since I could actually control the bane of my flight, I should have the upper hand. I really should. But then.. there was the thing with defence. And actual experience when it came to combat. The other Dragon, scaled and with iron hard skin, he knew how to fight. Though I SHOULD have the upper hand, he still hit me more often. I was losing.

Though my fists at the moment remained stronger, it helped little since I couldn't get a proper grasp of him. I retracted my hand, fired up my elbow, sent it towards the face of my enemy while the both of us remained airborne far up into the face. But he managed to move his head just in time, so my fist swiveled past, merely grazing his left cheek. Oh, he would feel it. It burned through his metal skin and made him bleed. Only grazing him would not stop the Iron Dragon Slayer, however, and my strength, no matter how superior, was not infinite.

He used the momentum to assault me with HIS fists. A hit against MY face. Another at my ribs, my stomach, and then he swirled around, kicked my so hard in the stomach that he sent me falling diagonally towards the water edge that had felt so infinitely far away just a second ago. And perhaps had he followed me to finish the job had it not been for a rising embodiment of fire that just then connected a flaming fist with the Iron Dragons Slayers jaw.

And I was falling, my body was broken, and it was almost impossible to move. I saw only one possible solution other than merely giving up, and giving up was NOT an option while I still held the ability to breathe and produce any kind of thought. So I reached a shattered hand into the pocket on my shorts, where another secret lay awaiting. With a silent groan I managed to feel my way to the right object and drag it out, stick it into one of my open wounds. The body is made out of 70 % water. That would have to do.. for now.

"Open. The gate.. of the water bearer. AquarIUS!" and the key protruding from my body started glowing moments before I hit the ocean and made the surrounding water boil as I headed for the depths.

Natsu Dragneel was not far behind his blonde roommate, being given a lift by his partner and blue friend Happt. He had gladly assaulted the other Dragon Slayer had it not been for another foe that momentarily interrupted him in his pursuit (Happy flew off somewhere and went momentarily missing in case you're wondering). He soon recognised the foe to be a fire mage like himself as he lunged his first attack and found his own flames taken from him, stolen by the guy that DID get punched in the face, but not hard enough since the edge of it was taken along with the fire.

Just as he stood there staring at his fist with wonder a crushing sound alerted him just in time before Lucy Clive came crushing through the roof, collided with the giant lacrima the asshole Natsu currently found himself in combat with had claimed would not be broken under his watch. So much for his words, for the giant glass lacrima shattered into thousands of razor shards as Lucy hit it, though it did not even serve to stop her flight as she continued on to the ground.

"Something tells me daddy dearest didn't tell us everything about his lovely lost daughter..." a voice called out, and Natsu saw a man appear, entering through the ne. Long black hair, his face covered in metal studs. Iron Gajeel... Oh, how he wanted to beat the crap out of that man and end what he had started at the Phantom Lord guild earlier. But he continued fighting that other guy, using his bare fists, landing a blow on the mans shoulder, ducking and jumping backwards in order to avoid a slash from the sword the guy used with a certain degree of skill. Nothing like Erza, but he HAD held a sword before.

"Quite a guildmate you got there," the man with the white and black hair commented, his focus on Natsu.

"Like the fact that you aren't a Celestial mage at all." Gajeel commented in the background, and Natsu both heard and felt the crackling ground as Lucy once more lauched herself at the guy. And he worried, because he had fought Lucy before. She COULD hit, but her aim was.. she could take quite a beating, but she clearly had not fought too many times before. Not human foes, in any case. His worries were confirmed the moment after as the girl once more crashed into the ground. And the guy in front of the Fire Dragon Slayer actually lowered his sword as he stared at that very spot, and Natsu turned his head to look as well.

She roared, a roar that rippled through the air and that was filled with agony as Lucy somehow managed to get back up on her feet. And the eyes of the Dragon Slayer widened as he saw the state that she was in. Her body was partly covered in shards, but even HE could see how her right hand was nothing but flesh and shattered bone at the moment, and how glass protruded from her body in different areas, creating fleshy wounds that efficiently was bleeding her dry. And her eyes, black as night, flowing with bloody tears, streaking up her weary face as she grimaced and then closed her eyes.

"What kind of monster IS she?" the all but forgotten swordsman asked, distaste in his voice, and Natsu snapped his head back to the man. The look in that face. Disgust. And Natsu remembered, in the bathroom not so long ago. The word that had been carved into her back. Something that she had seemed so ashamed of. The incident had never been mentioned later, but he remembered. Natsu Dragneel decided that whatever kind of fight he was fighting at the moment, it needed to be finished fast so he could be by HER side before she died. So he set his fists on fire and the rest of his body as well. He set himself on fire and fed his emotions to the flames, making them grow redder and wilder.

The man uttered something about it having no use, but Natsu was determent. HIS flames were HIS flames. No one could take them from him, least of all THIS man.

FLASHBACK

"You are as hotheaded as your magic, aren't you?" Lucy said, facing him like he wanted her to.

"Hey! I'm not hotheaded!" he exclaimed, and pouted.

"I envy you," she said then, and got up, stretched her body. It was raining. Had been for a while. Had she been sleeping ever since he started looking, in this cold and wet weather?

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" the fire mage exclaimed, without sounding too angry. He did not understand her. She was so.. odd.

"I bet that your flames are bright and ever changing like your mood. Mine, however..." she continued, took the rocks out, the ones smelling like fire, hit them against each other so they created a tiny spark. Suddenly her hand was engulfed in a round, purple flame, the same that usually could be seen in a flame before it was extinguished. Natsu stared at it. Slowly Lucy lifted her hand in the air, closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

Then, with a sudden movement she trusted her hand into the ground. The effect was immediate and terrifying. The whole area around her exploded in flames, hot and almost lazily devouring everything living in the circle in the matter of seconds, leaving her in a black little crater. Natsu blinked. Once. Twice.

"Fight me!" he yelled. Lucy smiled calmly, shook her head.

"My flames are dying, and they make everything around me die. I do not wish to end you," she said. He didn't listen. His fist merely lit up with the bright flame and yelled a battle cry as he ran towards the girl.

FLASHBACK END

His flames were red and vibrant, and according to Lucy that was because his personality, so ruled by emotions, made them that way. And if emotions were what coloured his flames and made them his, then emotions would be what kept them from being anyone elses.

"Fire Dragons Blazing FISTS!" he yelled and he heard in the background Lucy yelling too. Had he turned, he would've seen her opening her black eyes just then.

"Dragons WINGS!" she yelled and out from her back they emerged, protruding through her wounds in the shape of vibrantly coloured flames since THIS time she was NOT fighting merely to survive. She was DETERMENT. STUBBORN. PROTECTIVE. And she took off, her wings creating a hot wind as she left the ground, spreading burning embers through the air, feeding the flames of her fellow Dragon Slayer as he charged, his fist finally hitting home with his flames still remaining his. It made contact with the jaw of the one he did not bother learning the name of and the poor fellow did not stand a chance any longer. He was sent flying through the air and through an existing hole in the wall, continued on until he was a mere star in the distance.

The scarfed boy then moved his gaze upwards and saw her far above. Winged and dangerous Lucy might be, but Gajeel was well experienced in the arts of combat, something Natsu knew very well. She would not hold out for long in her current state.

"Happy!" he yelled, and the blue feline reappeared from outside the castle walls where he had been circling while he waited to be of use once more.

"Aye sir!" he yelled, already aware of the wishes of his partner, and flew over to the boy, lifted him up and set off at full speed towards the fighting pair up there. Just as Lucy Clive was sent flying Natsu Dragneel appeared, his fist connecting with the jaw of Iron Gajeel.

MEANWHILE

Gray Fullbuster had been running around in the castle when he suddenly found himself on the roof, confronted by an odd woman wearing blue clothing.

"Drip. Drip. Drop." she chanted, and as if the skies heeded her words, raindrops started falling as the blue sky suddenly was filled with dark clouds.

"We are Juvia of the Deep. Juvia the Rain Woman. Who are you?" the woman continued, and the Ice mage momentarily let his battle ready fists fall to his sides.

"I am Gray. Gray Fullbuster. If you surrender now I will not hurt you." he said, seriously. The girl did not seem to be one to engage in combat, even though he sensed that she was strong. And Juvia.. blushed? Just then Lucy, that had jumped up to meet Iron Gajeel in combat far above them crashed into the girl, through the rood and further down into the depths of the castle.

"Juvia? Hello.. Lucy?" Gray asked, carefully approached the hole, looked down. The woman in blue was nowhere to be seen. What he DID see was Lucy far below, and Natsu..

"Juvia is the Rain Woman. Mere blows cannot hurt her." came the voice of the girl, and Gray turned to see a seemingly unharmed Juvia stand a while behind him, a gloomy look on her face.

"And you have BETRAYED Juvia with THAT girl!?" she continued, and the whole girl changed as she suddenly produced quite an amount of what seemed to be boiling water that she sent after the baffled boy that didn't have the time to do anything but lift his arms in front of him in an attempt to guard himself before he was enveloped in scolding hot water. What the... Betrayal? Oh well, no time to process her words, she had attacked him and now he needed to respond.

The Ice Mage gathered his magic and let it spread throughout his body, beyond and into the water. It cooled, it cooled rapidly and then froze completely as he took control over it completely and crushed it around his body, started running on the surface of the beam towards its point of origin where the girl would be waiting. Gray Fullbuster was not very inclined to hit a woman, but this was a fight and since Juvia would not surrender he would not dishonor her wish by going easy on her. So he gathered all his magic, was about to strike when...

Lucy came FLYING through the hole she had created earlier, and the action served to distract the Ice mage so much that he slipped and skidded the rest of the way on his stomach, crashing into his current foe so the both fell to the ground, and he lifted his gaze to look at the mage that knew his former mentor as she attempted to fight off Iron Gajeel, not really succeeding but trying valiantly none the less. He had seen her fight once, that day when Natsu finally managed to hit her. Lucy was strong, but her combat abilities were not backed up with much experience. Against her current foe she was at a disadvantage. And then, she was sent flying, away from the castle and towards the ocean, the laughing Gajeel about to follow her when another flaming figure came flying out of the hole in the roof and took him on.

Then Gray remembered that he was in the middle of a battle himself, and looked down, only to notice that one, where had his shirt and pants gone? He was currently only clad in his underwear. Two, he was currently holding onto the right breast of his opponent. He jumped off her in an instant, yelling apologies and half expecting an assault that could be rivalled only by Erza herself. But Juvia of the Deep was out cold, smiling and blushing brightly.

And since the fight of course ended since one of the two had lost consciousness he walked over to the edge of the roof, looked towards the spot where he thought Lucy would have landed. She might hold the ability to swim, but the girl was not a great swimmer by any standards. Besides, she had taken a beating and might've lost consciousness. He arrived at the edge of the roof, and what he saw was.. odd. The water in that area was moving around and around, creating a giant whirlpool that probably couldn't be seen from land. And flames seemingly merged into the violent current.

MEANWHILE

Aria of the Wind, the strongest of the Element Four, consisting of Juvia, Sol, the Fire mage from earlier and Aria, was facing Titania. He was no joke, his magic invisible and possibly crippling. It was wind magic, invisible for the naked eye and capable of stripping a mage of all his or her magic. He was the one to strip Master of HIS magic power for one.

And while he surely thought himself to be brilliant for doing so, he had failed to take one major detail into account. Titania. She had been roaming the castle for a while longer than her other friends, heard the crashing sound of what she did not know to be Lucy being beaten once and then twice into the ground, followed by the scream of betrayal from a Juvia of the deep. In fact, by the time Erza Scarlet and Aria came upon each other, Gray had already defeated Juvia and was staring at the odd whirlpool.

Erza Scarlet, Fairy Queen and nicknamed Titania. She glowed as she requipped into her heavens wheel armour. He might've spoken, Aria. Spoken of the sadness of the impending doom that would be awaiting all those that called themselves Fairy Tail mages. Erza did not heed his words, however, merely charged, cut through his numeral attempts to halt her with his invisible wind attacks. And she took off from the ground, landed her attacks before softly landing on the ground behind him, her eyes cold as she turned around just in time for the foe to collapse on the ground.

"No one messes with Fairy Tail." she stated cooly.

MEANWHILE

Elfman Strauss was trapped. His body was stiffening slowly, turning to stone as he was forced to relive the death of Lisanna Strauss over and over again. He heard the roar in the great distance, and the shaking of the building as it in the middle of all this transformed into a giant robot. But there was nothing to be done. HER death was his fault. His fault. HIS FAULT.

FLASHBACK

"Be a man!" Elfman yelled as he sat down by the bar-counter, and ordered a manly beer from his sister.

"What does that mean?" a voice asked, and he looked to see the girl sitting beside him. Lucy Clive, wasn't it? Possibly the niece of the ever traveling Gildarts Clive?

"What?" he asked.

"What does it mean to be a man?" the girl asked, cocked her head to the side and seeming honestly curious about his answer.

"To protect your family and never step down from a fight." he replied as if it was the most obvious thing in this world. The girl smiled. There was an edge to that smile, and then she looked forward.

"You lost someone." she stated simply, and the smile was gone.

"What?" he asked. How did she know? How could Lucy know about Lisanna? No one ever talked about her.

"You lost someone. You have that look. That mourning look." she explained, the girl. Then she sent him a long look.

"You mourn a death. Mourning a death is important. But you do not mourn the dead. You honour them." she said, and then she got up from her seat, and left to somewhere without another word.

FLASHBACK END

*You do not mourn the dead. You honour them*

And then he heard her, from so far away. The voice of his older sister Mirajane, yelling with all the volume she could muster. Encouraging him. And Elfman Strauss knew that no matter how guilty he might feel about the death of his younger sister, he could not leave his older sister alone, nor could he leave anyone else in his family, stretching beyond the limit of blood, alone. And Lisanna Strauss. Sweet, kind, understanding Lisanna Strauss would not be honoured if he ended as a stone statue today.

So Elfman roared. He roared and gathered that magic he had laid to rest two years ago, the same magic that had been fatal to his sister. And he took it in, let it embrace him but NOT take him over. And like that, the Beast King take-over made its appearance, and Sol of the Earth was beaten repeatedly to the ground until he lost consciousness.

MEANWHILE

They fought on, Dragon Slayer versus Dragon Slayer that flew above the construction, landing on the top of the building where Gray stood a while away from the limp body of Juvia, his battle over and done with. In a hole in the castle Elfman could be seen, putting his thumbs up for his older sister, his battle also ended in victory. A limping Erza made it to his side, smiling at him, showing that she too had achieved what she had come for.

And with a finishing sets of blows they fell, the last remaining fighters, when Natsu finally managed to hit Gajeel so hard in the face that he stumbled backwards and disappeared into the hole created by the falling Lucy earlier. With a groan Natsu collapsed next to Gray that was standing and looking at ocean still, his brows furrowed. He looked down at the Dragon Slayer as he arrived, however, not bloating since the castle had stopped moving after the last of the Element Four had been defeated.

"You think she'll be alright? I mean, this is Lucy we're talking about, she'll just be eaten by some shark and fished up by some fisherman, right?" Natsu questioned, not able to move an inch further.

"Somehow.. I doubt that." Gray replied airily, sending another glance towards the ocean. It was flat as a mirror now, the whirlpool gone without a trace. Like the silence before a storm.

The large construction that looked strangely like a robot complete with legs rand everything halted, the large circle it had been writing gone from existence. In the meantime the Fairy Tail mages, the ones still remaining on land that is, kept fighting the Shades summoned by the still missing Master of Phantom Lord. They started cheering due to the apparent victory though, since the ones sent over to that thing clearly had managed to stop it.

That was when the Shades started to merge to the laughter of its puppeteer. They all merged into a giant black ball, fists appearing from its core and starting to hit the already heavily damaged guild.

The cheers turned to shrieks of horror, the mages resuming their battle that once more had turned into a desperate one. Not the guild. Not their home. Not now, when they were so close to victory. And what of Lucy? One individual stared out to the ocean, his orange hair sticking in every direction. That girl... In the middle of the battle no one had the time to think of her, and relied on her strength to survive. A survivor, that girl, water would hardly be the thing to off her. Hopefully.

A spot in the ocean started boiling, and Lucy Clive, or was it Heartfilia(?), rose slowly from the ocean, blood running from her black eyes and her mouth, her ribcage all but shattered and her broken arms lifted for battle. The water moved in a circle around her, merged with the fire, and then exploded upwards into a tsunami that moved towards the shore. No.. way. Loke took an involuntary step backwards before shouting the warning they needed, his guild mates, that started running when they saw what was coming towards them, a mass of water and fire that no doubt would lead destruction with it.

"Okay, come on, make this QUICK, or I will PERSONALLY stand for the punishment of whoever causes her death!" yelled the woman in her scary voice, her long blue hair flowing behind her as she rode the wave, tch-ing over the flames that kept merging with HER water. No one was allowed to let Lucy die now, for Aquarius would be the one to personally kill her when this nightmare was over. Summoning her out of her own BODY. The NERVE!

The wave hit the shore, moved towards that unattractive blob of black something, mainly steered by the raging fire that was set dead on protecting the guild. As it washed over the ugly thing it split up in shades again, and her brothers attacked. Cancer and Taurus. Pathetic little pricks, nothing like HER sweet and loving BOYFRIEND. Aquarius stopped and looked at the shocked mage in front of her.

"Long time no see.. Loke." she paused a moment too long before she uttered his name. There was many things she knew of this man.

"What are you d..?" he began, beyond surprised by her appearance.

"What do you THINK, dimwit. I am trying to avoid my masters death." she pointed at the girl that stood beside her, her magic power starting to deplete now. How could she remain alive with such a rampaged body, much less STAND on her own two feet?

"Lu..cy?" he said. But.. she was a Dragon Slayer. Wasn't she?

"What's left of her. She should've summoned us BEFORE she lost so much.. everything. Blood, bones, don't want to think what her innards look like.." the mermaid grimaced.

"Gate of the.." Aquarius stopped her master with a hand over her mouth before she could finish the incantation.

"Enough. They're already out." she said, her voice almost soft. Aquarius having a soft voice was a very rare occurrence. The girl started coughing more blood, but smiled through bloodied teeth anyways, something that made the water bearer tsk again, not admitting to her rare show of kindness.

"It's over..." she muttered suddenly, and gone she was, her siblings with her, leaving an as good as dead girl behind, a girl who's magic power suddenly retreated back into her body, disappearing without a trace to whatever hidden place it usually was stored, and the girl collapsed forward, barely caught by the slightly older male.

The moment after the sky was lit up by a magic circle that lit up everything, obliterating all shades, all darkness and that even healed the Fairy Tail members some. They all knew who the magic circle belonged to. Master Makarov had returned, and he had served justice in a true Fairy Tail fashion. Fairy Law. Thusly, the great battle of the guilds that shared the title as strongest in Fiore came to an end, leaving a single guild standing.

Phantom Lord was no more, the main guild falling into the ocean, all the smaller fractions mysteriously beaten by an unknown enemy. Fairy Tail, the victor, was left with a ruin for a guild, and a lot of injured members. It didn't stop them from cheering, jumping about despite their exhaustion and in some cases broken limbs. Nothing would bring this guild to their knees while they stood together, and that they intended to do until the end of time itself.

"We did go slightly overboard, though," the Master uttered as he looked at the ruins of the guildhall, sighing heavily since he knew a lot of work lay ahead of them. He had been considering expanding the guild for some time now, though, and the demolition of the old guild had practically been done for him, so he guessed he had SOMETHING to thank Phantom Lord for. THIS time he would build a pool for sure so the female members of the guild could cool themselves down in their bikinis.. Yes. He would do that.

"Master, what do we do now?" asked Erza, stopping his impure fantasies from developing any further.

"We move forward!" he announced, and lifted his fist into the air to show off the sign of Fairy Tail comradehood. They cheered with him, his children, the ones that hadn't given in to exhaustion and injuries and that now were being carried off to a temporary infirmary led by a very unhappy Porlyusca.

Well... The Magic Council wouldn't be happy about this. Hostility between guilds wasn't technically legal, and outright WAR like this.. The man broke out crying at the mere thought of it, freaking out some of the people standing about. Indeed. The Council would be displeased, and Fairy Tail wasn't exactly on the good side of them as it was...


	14. Home

"I want you out of this house, NOW." uttered a fairly annoyed Porlyusca as she ushered Happy, Natsu and Gray out of her home where they had been visiting a still sleeping Lucy. They had been there frequently ever since she was brought there the day referred to as the Phantom Lord Incident, and the old healer was not pleased by this new bout of popularity, not to speak of noise.

Erza would've come too and added her voice to the mix, but she had stayed back at the base of the guild where major construction had been set into motion in order to rebuild Fairy Tail as soon as possible. For the guild was to be rebuilt, and she had set it upon herself to oversee that things went according to plan.

In the meantime the guildhall remained outside in the, thankfully, lovely weather that Magnolia had received lately, with the mission board up and ready for all who wished to contribute with money by doing missions rather than staying at the site building the guild itself. Since Erza was the second in command after Master the choice remained pretty much like that, unless injuries made it impossible.

The healing mage sighed after slamming the door in the face of the young folk, wandered back to the circular room that worked as both bedroom and working room.

"Are they gone?" I mumbled, opened an eye to look at the old woman, her pink hair made up in a tight knot and only letting a part of her fringe free to hang loose and surround her face. The knot made her face look even stricter.

"They are. I find your recovery rate very remarkable, young lady, especially considering the sheer amount of fractured bones and ruptured organs. You should be dead, much less awake." she said it strictly, and I smiled while staring at the wooden roof. Indeed. I should be many things, dead ranking quite high on that list.

"You might be right." I chose to reply, coughed a bit due to my damaged lungs that were in the painful process of reinflating and repairing themselves. I would need food soon in order to keep my metabolism running high. The Phantom Lord Leader had fed me somewhat during my short stay, and that combined with the excellent patchwork of one of his healers had made it possible for me to go all out like that, though I now was rendered pretty much useless. And in pain. It was hard forgetting about the pain.

It had been two weeks, and only now had my body mustered the strength to heal my second lung enough for it to be used. Two weeks. I could still hardly walk. Doing what I did with already fractured bones was always a bad idea. The force alone could've been enough to break them, and I hadn't exactly just walked about doing nothing before the whole incident took place. There had been the Northerners, the sharks, that odd lady...

My spirits had even made an appearance. Aquarius would murder me the next time I summoned her, of that I was certain, since I distinctly remembered her saying something about a date that day, and while I didn't really understand the significance I knew it meant a lot to her, and that she would become REALLY cranky every time I interrupted one of them. That AND the fact that I summoned her using my own blood. There was that too. Not the most pleasant way to be summoned.

"Mind telling my why you don't want to see your friends? Not that I mind the silence, but I would've thought you like company just like the rest of the Fairy Tail brats..." Porlyusca said and sat down by her working station, started pulverising some herbs in a pestle and mortar, no doubt for some new kind of remedy. Or something. Might even be a poison for all I knew, since I was utterly unfamiliar with this woman's hobbies.

"I'm not too familiar with noise. Usually after adventures like that, I would remain alone for a while. Sometimes days. Sometimes weeks. Not even my spirits would visit..." I replied softly. I didn't hate noise. Not really. It was merely.. unfamiliar.

"Spirits?" the older woman questioned. I guessed she might require an elaboration.

"Yeah... Something about it draining away my magical power and slowing my healing rate." I elaborated. I didn't know too much about it, but knew it required some magic power summoning spirits. Therefore it made sense to keep them from popping out while my body needed the magical power to fix itself. Lung over company, in a way.

"You have spirits?" quite persistent, Porlyusca. And what kind of question was that, anyways?

"Of course I do. Wouldn't be much of a Celestial Mage without them..." I mumbled and closed my eyes again. Sleepy. So sleepy. I hoped no one perished in this fight. As far as I knew, I had been the lucky one to destroy my body the most, but that was alright. Happened more often than I'd care to mention. The fun part of having very bad defence skills. Sure, I could stop a fairly strong hit with my hand. That was the extent of it, however. I was not too good at dodging while fighting, and running was no fun.

"Have fun with your herbs, Porlyusca. I think I will sleep some more..." my voice became sluggish at the end of the sentence, and I only made out fractions of a disgruntled reply before sleep caught hold of me again.

A few more days now, and it would be time.

*I am going home. LC*

I left the note on the bed, stripped off the dress I had worn so far and replaced it with my shorts, still containing my collection of keys. I didn't have many, only.. hm.. Lyra, Cancer, Taurus, Aquarius, Horologium, Crux, and that strange one I had picked up last time I got lost on my way to Magnolia. I hadn't formed a contract with him yet, the Canis Minor, Nicola. I should do that soon... That would make six, and a half. Soon to be seven. Not too bad, actually.

The bandages should be enough to keep me decent if I wore my shorts only, but I donned a green singlet just to be sure. Should be okay. Father didn't like me dressed too sparsely anyways. It was finally time to visit THAT man and tell him to back off my guild. My guild. The thought alone made me smile. They accepted me, fought for me and even cared for me when I got hurt. This sour woman I currently stayed with ASSUMED us to be friends. Such a weird assumption, but it made me feel all warm and giddy on the inside. Friends. My friends. Me having friends.

I left the house, a strange place made out of a hollowed tree that seemed to be alive still. This Porlyusca was quite the healer even with her obvious distaste for company. She had a weak spot for Master it would seem. Perhaps a weak spot for everyone belonging in Fairy Tail in general. Altogether she had a good heart, I could tell as much, though she frightened me sometimes. Though she looked kind of frail, it was something about those steely eyes that spoke of hidden power, and her VOICE. She DID have quite a voice on her when she got annoyed.

"It would seem you will get your way after all, Father. Your so called lost daughter is coming home for a visit..." I muttered to myself and dragged a hand through my hair. I might want to look for a river on my way there, my hair was REALLY greasy and I needed to wash my wounds. No deep rivers though, if I fell in my lungs wouldn't take it too well being only barely healed as of yet.

I started walking, moving in between the trees while being careful not to leave any signs behind alerting possible pursuers of the direction I was heading. A skilled huntsman might be able to follow but I could hide my tracks nicely if I had to. Mama would say that I made it harder for her to find me because of those skills, but I had acquired them in order to make other people NOT find me. Usually I just ended up not finding myself too.

Father was a person I feared more than most things, but this clearly needed to be done. He had sent an entire guild after me and thus starting a very little appreciated war. The Guild had been destroyed completely and now needed to be rebuilt. Sure, Master had planned to improve the building for some time now. I learned as much when Gray talked to what he assumed to be my sleeping body. Still. Father had gone over the line.

The sun was well up above, shining down and making everything seem prettier. No clouds could be detected, birds chirped happily, adults moved about with their children, smiling and talking about ice cream, trips in the park or perhaps toys. Children liked toys, after all.

A couple were discussing what to have for dinner tonight, torn between whether or not to have dessert today, the woman coming with most arguments both for and against it. It would be unhealthy, but it was good. Not that they did it everyday, but there was a reason for that. Their teeth would surely not benefit from it, but it wasn't like they were going to do it EVERY day. But then her best friend HAD told her that her hips had grown lately. Better not, then. Her boyfriend remained silent during the monologue of his loved one, probably uncertain of what to say. I wondered if the facade would remain when the two of them were alone. I wondered if they all wore masks, pretending to be things they weren't.

I stood in the middle of the street, looking up at the castle-like construction standing there in the distance, seemingly mocking me, daring me to come closer. I didn't want to come closer, though. I didn't WANT to talk to the person living there. Living in a place like that, I would already place him in the category referred to as assholes.

Not that I knew who lived there. Father certainly didn't. Once more I dragged a hand through my hair, freshly washed and everything. I had even used soap! Soap I got from Cancer, no less, as he fixed my hair. Not that it did me much good now. I glared the nice building on the top of a hill, looking down on the town. It WAS mocking me, surely. I sighed.

"I am utterly lost..." I muttered to myself where I stood. It was a nice town. Green grass, chirping birds, happy families. I didn't know where I was, though. The *home* I had referred to in the note it was not. In hindsight walking off into the woods hadn't been the best of ideas.

"Lucy?" I was sitting on a bench when I heard someone calling my name. Had they found me already? I turned, only to see a slightly green Natsu coming staggering towards me. I recognised that look everywhere. He had been on a train again, hadn't he? But how would he know that I would be here? Even I didn't know that. I didn't even know where HERE was.

"What are you doing here?" he asked. So I wasn't caught due to an epic manhunt. Not yet anyways.

"I'm lost," I replied then. Telling him as much didn't hurt, and it was the honest truth. He laughed and stood before me, practically beaming.

"It's REALLY good you're here, actually. I'm on a job and I could use your help!" he seemed eager, his motion sickness all but forgotten. That kid really DID recover quickly. And he found nothing strange in me being here, in the middle of.. where was I? Still didn't know.

"Aye!" Happy chimed in. The two of them made me smile. Not like I had anything better to do right now anyways. I decided mentally to take the train the rest of the way to Father. A train station should be situated near his place after all. And trains would pass by Fathers place.

"Okay.. What is this job about?" I asked, hoped for the mission to be over quickly so I could continue on my merry way. Not that the way would be merry with THAT destination laying ahead.

"We're supposed to steal this book from that mansion on the hill and destroy it. I was on my way to see the clients now. Want to join in? I'll give you a third of the reward!" Natsu explained loudly.

"Sure. I could do with some money," I replied, got up and followed Natsu to the place where the clients would be waiting. I could need some money for the train, for starters. This mission seemed easy enough. Easy money. I liked the sound of that. I needed money for the train.


	15. Maids and Fathers

I stood in front of my fellow Fairy Tail mage behind some bushes and a tree, the gate going into Evarloo mansion on the other side.. of the bushes. And the tree... At the moment I was wearing some kind of frilly, very revealing Maids Outfit. Why?

"Why am I wearing this?" I conveyed my thoughts to the guy that just went out and announced me to be his partner. As in a person he and Happy would be going on missions with. I didn't know such an agreement had to be made but if the boy wanted to be partners on this mission then sure. But why the Maids Outfit?

"The Duke of Evarloo is seeking a new maid to hire. Thought it would be fun to dress up and sneak in. I thought about just burning the place down but Master asked me to keep a low profile now since the Magic Council is all over us after the Phantom Lord incident." he explained. So, basically, I had to pretend to be a maid that wanted to be hired by this Duke. Had Natsu intended to use this himself? I sent him a strange glance, but he was too busy looking for any sign of life coming from the gate to notice it.

"So I need to be cute and hireable. Got it." I stated before I emerged from the bushes, straightened my too short skirt and looked between the bars of the gate. It was quite the mansion, the very same I had seen from the village I had found myself in earlier. Hopefully the guy living here, this Duke of Evarloo, would be nicer than I had first thought him to be. Mayhap would he NOT be an absolute asshole like his mansion suggested him to be.

"Hello? I heard you're hiring a new maid. I came to apply... Hello?" I used my nice voice, mimicking that of some girl talking to her boyfriend in the village. That was considered nice, wasn't it? I hoped so. Some of the cute young girls had used that tone in the village in the North too. Not that often when talking to me, but that was alright. Most people did not speak to me in a nice tone. Except from some of the old people that had nice voices towards everyone, and the young ones that did not see me as a monster.

The ground started shaking after a few more hellos and I shifted my gaze towards the ground. What now? Up from the ground he emerged, a fat man an his four..maids. Very STRANGE maids. Even I found them strange. Firstly I wasn't quite sure whether or not some of them were in fact males. They might be. Not that it mattered. I smiled innocently at the man, repeated my line. I had heard that he was in the market for a new maid, and I wished to apply.

"Who would like to hire an UGLY maid such as yourself! Go home, UGLY!" he replied me and poked me hard on my forehead. Or perhaps was it just some strange sort of pointing?

"Yes, go home, UGLY!" the maids repeated before they all disappeared back into the hole. I blinked. Once. Twice. What just happened? I furrowed my brows while I went back into the forest where my current partner stood waiting.

"I don't think they liked me..." I stated simply. The boy smiled a smile that suggested he knew it would fail all along, and his fist flamed up.

"Plan B it is, then!" he announced, and I had an idea what the B stood for. Burn the place down. Sounded more like like a plan Natsu would go for. And while that plan sounded easy enough, I distinctly remembered him giving me a reason why plan "Burn the place down" shouldn't be executed. Something about some council being mad at us, wasn't it?

"Didn't you say you had to keep a low profile because of the whole Council thing?" I asked.

"Yeah, but it can't be helped. The first plan didn't work, so.." Natsu replied, seemingly very determent regarding this new plan.

"Well I got a plan..." I announced, cutting him off since I saw him starting to move towards the mansion while he excused himself with that weird excuse. He looked at me with puppy-dog eyes.

"It involves Ninjas." I baited. He was hooked right away. Even I found the boy to be easily figured out at times. Then again, I got my idea from a relative that had the same childish demeanour. Ninjas. Usually a safe go.

There is a certain time in your life when you have to admit defeat, and just acknowledge the fact that the idea that seemed so plausible earlier is utter shit. Today was just not my day.

Firstly, I had been running with an injured body that kept healing itself throughout the night, only to admit defeat when I got utterly lost and ended up in some weird village. Not only that, but I ended up meeting the ONE person I would rather avoid when running away from the guild to meet up with Father.

Then I got dressed up in some weird clothing, only to be declared ugly by a man that found it perfectly normal to move about by digging tunnels. Then there was the game of ninjas. Ninjas were supposed to be silent warriors moving without a sound in the shadows. The warrior part and the moving part would be the only thing a ninja and Natsu had in common. He was strong, and he was righteous, I knew that much. Silent.. not in a million years.

Which was why we made it all the way through the first door before being detected by some mercenaries that spoke in tongues and kept talking about their mother. Which was okay in itself, I talked about Mama all the time, but they also started insinuating that Mages remained helpless against their might due to some extra hours of physical training.

I decided to leave Natsu there, since he alone would manage the tow of them while I ran off in search of the book we had been requested to destroy, a huge reward waiting for us should we succeed. Happy decided to follow me for some odd reason, which I found strange since I hadn't exactly been kind to him the last time the two of us had been alone. Natsu HAD declared that he alone would be enough to handle the two mages downstairs though, so I guess the cat had little else to do.

Which brought me back to the time after Happy somehow came over the book by pure chance as we searched the library, then to be nearly crushed by one of the maids, a huge ogre of a woman with stubby, pink hair set up in pigtails that the moment after started chasing after me when Happy tossed the book over.

That is, until the structure beneath me gave in and I found myself screaming as I fell downwards towards the gods knew where, the odd fellow calling himself the Duke of Evarloo laughing while following me into the abyssal labyrinth that went all the way down to the sewers where he started spouting about some secret involving gold and written stuff. Where he got his ideas and why he was sharing said ideas with me was beyond my comprehension.

"Tell me the SECRET!" the creepy little man yelled as he suddenly emerged.. SWIMMING.. from the roof of the tunnel I currently were running through, holding on to that godforsaken book as if my life depended on it. This place was a maze. Even if I HAD a sense of direction, which I did NOT, I would be lost. And I was indeed lost. Very lost. Running through a maze of very dark tunnels with a psycho old creepy man digging his way after me and creating even more tunnels in the process.

"I don't KNOW about a SECRET!" I yelled back as I skidded to a halt, my instinct telling me that I was inches from colliding nose first with a wall. I was about to head into another tunnel when he finally managed to get a grip on my arm as he emerged from that very wall I almost collided with just as I turned.

"Stop lying you UGLY girl!" he exclaimed as he tried turning my arm behind my arm in a direction it was not supposed to bend it.

"HEY, stop touching me!" I shrieked. Normally I would've dealt with this, but alas, the Phantom Lord incident still affected me. And where was Happy? Why wasn't he here?

"Lucy!" as if he heard my thoughts I heard Happy yell from some tunnel not too far away. Not that I could see him in this scarce.. or more like none existent light.

"HAPPY!" I yelled back, groaned when the Duke bent my arm further.

"Now tell me the SECRET, girl, or I will snap that little twig of an arm of yours off." the Duke pressed out between closed teeth, his mouth right next to my ear. Oh no, he didn't. I started really fighting against him then, and the pain intensified as my arm was about to actually snap. The man really DID possess some strength in him, I'd give him that. And I was just at the point where I was accepting the fact that my right arm would be broken in my current escape plan when suddenly.. with a very weird sound.. Natsu appeared, hanging on the back of that monstrous Maid with the pink pigtails. I only saw him because his arm was ablaze, and he had this look in his eyes as he was mid-yell.

Thankfully the grip the Duke had on my arm loosened enough for me to keep my bones intact as I lunged forward as that strange survival instinct I had developed around Mama kicked in. Whenever she had THAT look in her face, the safest place to be.. BOOM.

And Natsu launched his attack, and the cramped space made the flames erupt outwards, giving me the feeling that plan B had been put into action after all.

One exploded mansion later...

"What are you doing?" Natsu asked me where I lay crouched by his legs, a certain book and cat in my grasp. Mama was not a fan of kicking too much, funnily enough, so whenever she got that "I'm going to torch this place now" look in her eyes the safest place to be would usually be by her feet. Had I not been so busy shielding the cat and the book I probably would've held onto his leg too, which probably would be a bit hard to explain.

"Nothing. Nothing at all. We need to get this thing to out client." I said as I got up, rolled my shoulder in an attempt to get the hurt out of it. I would get a bruise from this. Oh well. Worse things could have happened.

"You didn't burn it?" he questioned as we started walking, our path visible due to the flame in the palm of the boy. Natsu.

"Nope. Something tells me it's important to let that strange man see it." I replied. Just a feeling.

"Our client?" Natsu asked.

"Mhm." I confirmed.

"Oh. Okay. Maybe he wants to burn it." Natsu suggested.

"Aye SIR." Happy chimed in.

"Is your arm alright?" Natsu asked after a moment of silence.

"Yeah. You came just in time." I replied. I let it rest for now, used my right arm to carry the singed Duke over my shoulder. He had started rambling about some things that apparently weren't all that legal, so we had decided to bring him over to the police on our way to the client. The maid had mysteriously disappeared.

"..." Natsu opened his mouth, looked at me as if he wanted to say something.

"What?" I asked.

"I was going to ask if you know the way out, but then I remembered that your sense of direction sucks." he commented.

"HEY!" I exclaimed and hit him on the shoulder, efficiently sending him into the wall. We were soon on our merry way again.

"This is going to be a while, isn't it..." he said, and I saw him smiling. Though we were lot in some burnt out tunnels that led to the gods knew where he didn't seem too bothered.

"Yeah..." I agreed. We kept walking.

"Lucy?"

"Hm?"

"Why DID you jump in front of me like that?"

"It's something I always do when Mama is about to blow something up. You use similar magic, and I guess I feel safer when I'm closer to you. Mama always said that her magic wouldn't hurt me because we're close, and you and I.. we're friends." I replied, my gaze focused forward. Then I stole a glance at him.

"We're friends, aren't we? I mean, with us being partners and all now." I asked. He grinned widely at me then.

"Damn right we are!" he yelled. And we kept walking.

I handed the client his book, still whole. Oh, he had wanted it destroyed. I couldn't care less, my gut had just told me to hand the darn thing over rather than just torch the sucker on my way through the tunnels running from the man that kept talking about that secret. When I handed the book to the man that had hired us, the secret came into daylight. The book, Daybreak, wasn't named that at all, and was a very long letter to our client, the authors son as it turned out.

Another revelation, our clients were far from wealthy. Natsu had the decency to declare our mission void since we didn't do what it told us to and before I knew it we were heading for the train station. He had wanted to walk and I could secretly stand for the absolute possibility of doing so. I had walked here after all. I managed to change his mind though, albeit reluctantly, and the train soon took off, heading for Magnolia.

"I need to go to the restroom," I declared, got up while smiling at the drowsy cat. His partner had been knocked out cold by me earlier. Not that I liked hurting him but he had some decent instincts on him, and I needed him to be out of commission when I did this. Besides, he looked pitiful as soon as the train was set into motion.

I entered the restroom, opened the window there, looked back towards the door. Now or never. A train heading the opposite direction was heading towards this one, and I needed to be on it order to make it home before nightfall.

"Here goes nothing!" I hauled myself out of the window when the other train started passing. I would pass briefly the window where the two were sitting, but hopefully they would notice nothing.

I managed to get off the train I had been clinging to the top of for a good while, and looked about. This looked remotely correct, though I hadn't been here for what.. years now? I yawned loudly, stretched my stiff limbs since there would be none of that once I entered the property. Not very ladylike, after all. And I only got lost like.. once on my way here. Quite the miracle in itself. Well, there was no point in loitering about.

The people in the small village that lay next to the train station knew my face well, if their distorted grimaces were anything to go by. The whispering. The occasional rock that came flying from the shadows. Monster. Abomination. Cursed Child. Brat. Princess. The list of names went on. I had nearly forgotten about this. It was indeed a southern tradition to give me names. I managed to dodge most of the rocks. They didn't put much power into throwing them either. Most likely children. Home sweet home.

I soon left the remnants of the town behind, endless fields awaiting me until I would arrive at the mansion, only surrounded by the housing where the families of my servants would be accommodated. Upon my arrival they would probably greet me with tears in their eyes and then proceed to drag me off to give me some kind of frilly dress before I got summoned to HIS office. Frilly dresses. Ugh. Too hard to run in those. And I had tried, believe me.

I made my way through the empty halls of HIS castle. The large windows showed off the magnificent view, complete with green fields and mountains rising up in the distance. It felt lonely here, and cold. Not a home where some happy family would reside. There were reasons why I had left all those years ago with Mama.

Currently I wore a white and pink frilly dress, a tad tight around my body since it wasn't really been sown for me. My hair was made up in a nice looking bun that only let the fringe loose, framing my face. I hesitated outside the door, swallowed hard and mentally forced my hand to stop shaking. Then I knocked. It would be best to make this over and done with. Better sooner than later.

"Come in." that same strict voice. A man that had made me call him Father, though he was nothing of the sorts. My dad was Igneel, not this being that once had claimed to love my Mother more than anything.

I walked into the room, all but empty of furniture, but with shelves containing books from floor to roof. A blonde man made himself over to me from his desk that was placed at the other end of the room. His steps hit the floor harshly and he stopped right in front of me. Raised his hand. The sound of him slapping my face hard resounded in the room. I didn't move, just looked at him while my indifferent smile spread across my face.

"Long time no see, Father," I said politely.

"It would seem you came to your senses, Lu.."

"It is not like you to dirty your hands like that. What, fresh out of guilds to hire?" I interrupted him. Damn, he would be mad because of this, but I needed him mad. I WANTED him mad. I'd handle the consequences somehow. The look on his face told me I was succeeding. Great...

Happy had seen her pass by the window of the wagon, holding on to a train going in the opposite direction, something he had informed Natsu off when he became conscious. He hadn't thought much of it until the train finally stopped at the Station in Magnolia, and Gray and Erza stood there staring at him as he crawled off the train.

Erza held a note up, a note written in surprisingly neat letters, announcing that Lucy was heading home. Natsu took it that this home wasn't the cabin, and only one solution presented itself. Jude Heartfilia.

He remembered how she had looked when he found her sitting on that bench, staring ahead with that aloof expression, completely lost in her thoughts. She had jumped when he called her name, and he soon found out what she was doing there. Lost. Her sense of direction amazed him sometimes.

When he offered her to join up as partner on the mission he was on she smiled and said yes. Then the aloof expression returned as she followed him towards the client. She was thinking about something. She'd seemed a lot less tense though since the whole episode where she thought she'd been tossed out of the guild. She accepted the fact that she was wanted in the guild. A part of the family.

There was a village right by the train station where the four of them got off, a small place with a very cozy and filled with very friendly villagers that seemed thrilled that they got visitors coming by. At least until they found out why they were there. Their expressions changed as soon as Erza conveyed the purpose of their arrival. They were looking for a Lucy Clive, perhaps known around these parts as the daughter of Jude Heartfilia.

"Better not follow that Cursed Child. She only brings trouble with her."

"You're better off without her, trust me."

"You're not her friends. That creature has no friends."

"Monster."

"Abomination."

"Freak."

After they had assured the villagers that they indeed wanted to pursue the girl that apparently had many names around these parts, they pointed out of the directions to the Heartfilia property and retreated from them. The friendliness ceased, and the Fairy Tail mages only got glares instead.

He was running, running with his fellow guild mates, his speed increasing when he saw her huddled form. Was she kneeling in front what seemed to be.. a grave? They yelled her name, and she jumped, turned to face them. When Erza, Natsu, Happy and Gray made it over to her they saw what she was indeed doing. Weeding. She was weeding a grave. In front of a very big mansion.

"I thought you said you wanted to stay!" Natsu yelled accusingly, and the blonde blinked.

"I did. I still needed to talk to Father regarding some of the things he did. Sending a guild to fetch me was a bit over the top." she replied matter-of-factly, seemingly unaffected by the fact that she had left Fairy Tail without as much as a word of goodbye. Just a note telling them that she was going home.

"Aren't you terrified of him?" Natsu asked. He knew how scared she was. He had seen it when he found her after she was kidnapped by Phantom Lord.

"Yes. I thought I was going to die..." she said as she shivered before turning back to the flowerbed, looking at her work.

"Hm, I think that ought to do it. Meet Faith, my sister. Or.. half sister, I guess. She's Fathers real daughter." I smiled and pointed at the grave. The grave I had spent some time weeding in a vain attempt to calm my exposed nerves after the serious yell-down received by my not very pleased by my new sticking-up-for-myself policy Father.

"Little devil, she was. Used to run around and causing havoc in this place, making Father furious and Mama would laugh so hard every time he made that face. He would laugh too, back then. She was sick, when... I didn't know she died. Should've known, though. She was weak, even then. She might be able to kick through a wall, but she often got fevers and was bedridden..." I stopped talking. It had been a while since i had been here, and the date told me it also had been a while since my half sister was put into the ground. Pure, innocent Faith. I touched the grave one last time, then turned, started walking from the place I had left so long ago and that I had decided never to permanently return to. When I didn't sense my fellow Fairy Tail mages following I stopped, looked at them.

"You coming? I'm not going in the wrong direction, am I?" I could've sworn this was the right way. It was the direction I came from, wasn't it? I stared at the mansion. That was the angle I had seen it in when I arrived. My brows furrowed. This SHOULD be the right direction.

"You mean you didn't leave the guild?" Erza asked.

"Well, I did, and now I'm returning to the guild. Aren't you?" I replied.

"So you didn't come here to..." Gray let that one hang there.

"Do what? I told Father to back off, which wasn't very fun, by the way, and now I'm going back to Magnolia." I explained. I also needed new clothing. Since I didn't really wish to stay within the walls of the mansion after the show-down I had borrowed a dress from one of the maids I had met on my way out, a simple little thing that was a tad tight around my chest. I wanted to get out of this place and back to the cabin where I could find a new pair of shorts and a singlet that actually fit.

"Then.." Erza didn't continue either, but a smile grew on the face on Natsu as he practically jumped me into a tight hug.

"Southerners sure are strange. We should hurry up though, the sun will be setting soon, and when it sets the villagers start using their rifles." I pried the boy off of me and started walking.

"They seemed a bit off, the villagers." Erza commented as we made our way though the village that at the moment was in full lock-down where the only thing alerting me of their presence would be their stinging glares coming from between shutters.

"Did they throw rocks at you?" I asked. I hoped they didn't, but one could never know.

"No... They do that?" Gray asked.

"Sometimes." I replied nonchalantly.

"Why?" Natsu asked.

"They think I'm a vampire." I replied and smiled at them to show my slightly sharper than normal canine teeth. While my appearances alone weren't exactly what made them believe me to be a monster the way I looked didn't exactly work in my favour. Faith and I had done a lot of havoc here in our younger days.

"Oh..." we continued walking in silence, except from Happy that started talking about fish and how much he would love to have some. I remembered wanting fried fish too. That'd be nice. So Faith was dead. Kind of sad really. Not that I would cry, crying for the dead was a strange thing to do. Perhaps when I got some time alone. I had managed to find my tears again now, after all. Who knew what would happen next?


	16. Fishing for Lions

I was sitting on the floor of the guild, eating fish on a stick. Nice, fried fish. Oh how I had craved this for a long time. Why was I sitting on the floor? Didn't know, just felt like it. During my time in the North tables hadn't really been a usual thing either. The South had more of those, and right now I would like to forget the things Father had taught me back in the days.

During the Phantom Lord incident I almost died, but my meeting with Father still scared me many times more. I had thought my last hour had been then and there, but somehow I made it out alive. Heck, I even got myself an escort back to the guild. Now I only needed a few days with things that did NOT remind me of the man and I would be fine. Tables was on the list of such things. And plates. Hence the fish on the stick.

This was break-time, of course. The guild was far from finished. With my strength I was a good asset though my skills when it came to anything more specific than carrying stuff around were limited. I had already broken a few walls to prove it when I got the option of taking a break. Which wasn't an option, by the way, since Erza was the one to suggest it. More like an order. An order with an underlying death threat.

"What's up, Lucy?" I jumped from my spot on the floor which also happened to be in the middle of the open bar, surrounded by workers and guests that went on with their daily ways, fighting, drinking and discussing jobs, girls or whatever they usually did. The one to address me was a person I had seen before, a guild member, but I'd never spoken to him before.

A playboy he was called, whatever that was, with wild orange hair and always wearing shades. He had his green jacket on and usually held a posture of someone that took the world on without much care. I wondered briefly what his secret was.

"Nothing much. I'm no good with tables is all. I'm sorry, but I don't know who you are..." I replied. Technically speaking I DID know, he'd always been there, in the fringes, trying to approach me but usually being held up by something. Other girls, fighting males. Sometimes I left or got dragged off before he got to me as well.

"Loke. The name's Loke." he said, his voice sounding.. strange. Soothing, kind of. Why was that?

"Like the god?" I asked, reminiscing the bedtime storied Mama told me on her good nights. Tales of gods, and dragons and heroes of old.

"What?" he questioned.

"Well, not really a god, more like an immortal trickster. Mama told me stories when I was younger. I'm northern, after all." I explained. Did a trickster and a playboy resemble each other, mayhap? Loke had been a charmer too, as well liked as he was resented due to his many misadventures and practical jokes played on fellow immortals, and sometimes humans. I'd always liked his stories, because he too was an outcast that eventually was alienated by his fellow gods because he was different.

"Ah.. yeah, like the god, then." the boy named Loke replied, his voice telling me I had caught him off guard. Perhaps did he not know the tales surrounding his name.

"Want some fish, Loke?" I held up a stick with one of the untouched pieces, since I doubted the guy would want the half eaten piece I currently was holding in my other hand. Fish was good stuff. Usually it was considered a food for cats, but by me it was considered food for gods. Who didn't like fried fish?

"Are you a celestial mage?" he asked instead, looked at the fish as if he wanted it, but already decided against taking it. I nodded. Then I lowered my hand with the untouched fish, since he obviously had decided not to have any of it. There was no point in tempting him any more if he didn't want to eat even though he clearly secretly wanted to.

"Aquarius claims so, yes, and her brothers Cancer and Taurus agrees. I prefer calling myself a Fire mage, though. I don't like sending for them when I'm battling," I answered.

"And why is that?" he asked, and I smiled. I then finished the rest of my food, got up on my feet while staring at him intently, something that made the boy take a few steps backwards. Was he scared of me?

"That's a stupid question, Loke the trickster. What if they got hurt? Friends don't let friends get hurt." I laughed at his stunned expression. Laughing. It made me feel weird, but in a good way.

"You're strange." I continued, and with that I left him standing where he was, slightly cowering from me as if I was some kind of.. monster.

"You regard your spirits as friends?" he yelled after me, and I halted, turned to face him.

"Their words, not mine. I don't have friends. At least I didn't use to..." I added the last part as an afterthought. Erza hadn't given me much choice regarding that matter when I attempted to explain to her that me and friends didn't go well together. And I already sort of regarded them as friends, even though I did not expect them to feel the same way.

When my explanation didn't suffice as a legit explanation she stated that yes, I was her friend, and I also had a friend in every Fairy Tail member. Her skills with her large collection of sharp objects kept me from protesting, so now I had a lot of friends on my hands.

"Hey! Let's go to the bath-house!" an all to familiar voice called out before I found myself slung to the ground by the force of impact when Natsu jumped me. I barely saw the trickster leave before I turned my attention to my assailant.

"There are a lot of rivers in the forest. Why visit a house dedicated to bathing?" I asked. And besides, Natsu already had a bath-room in his house.

"Haven't you ever been to a bath-house before? Or a hot spring?" he asked me then, my partner. I still had sort of a hard time understanding what this new role I had acquired. Partner. We WERE friends, and I might not know too much about the term other than the fact that it meant that we were not enemies and would stand up for each other, but what was a partner then? What did it mean to be a partner? Did it mean that we would hang out more? Was I like Happy, perhaps? Like Odin was to Mama?

"Huh? What are you talking about? I've been to a hot spring before, sure, but there were no houses nearby, and I had to leave pretty early because of.." I started. Yeah, that was another story. One ending with being one of those Wyvern incidents where I almost drowned when I fell into one of those underwater rivers that ended up in the river passing by the village. The old man had fished me up then too, and he had served me pickled plums and hot tea to get the hypothermia out of me while he taught me how to tend to my wounds.

"Then let's go!" declared Natsu without listening to a word I said, started dragging me along. Why did I get a feeling that he too had been temporarily exiled from constructing? Was he the cause to the fire I thought I smelled coming from the construction site?

"You set something on fire, didn't you." I said accusingly.

"Maybe... Now let's go before Erza finds me!" he replied while he continued dragging me along when suddenly, a sword appeared in front of us, nearly cutting Natsus throat thus making him freeze mid-run, looking at Erza while sweat started to appear on his forehead. Speak of Erza and Erza shall appear. Seemed to be that way anyways.

"Where do you think you two are going?" she asked softly in a voice that might be either kind or warning about impending pain.

"Bath-house?" he tried, very careful and with hope in his voice. Silence. The sword remained in place.

"Seems like a good idea." she said then, surprising the both of us and finally removing the sharp weapon. I used the momentum to free myself from his grip.

"I have something I need to check first." I declared.

"What?" Natsu asked, his pout threatening to make an appearance.

"Just something. At the graveyard." I said.

"Come on, the bath-house is fun." he tried. Fun, huh.

"It's warm though, isn't it?" I asked.

"Yeah.. why?" Gray asked, mysteriously just there.

"I prefer cold water." I said.

"You're a fire mage that prefers COLD water?" Gray didn't seem to believe in my words. Understandable.

"Sometimes." I answered. Right now I did, if nothing else, mainly due to some.. circumstances.

"What..?" I heard Loke stop somewhere behind me. I didn't turn while I kept tending to the grave in front of me. A lone grave situated in front of a waterfall that continued almost infinitely. I should know, I fell from it earlier. Thankfully the water at the bottom was deep, so I suffered little damage. Had there been sharp rocks like there often was at the end of such masses of falling water I would've been in trouble.

"I got lost a while back, you know, and came across this place." I said calmly as I looked over my work. The grave only needed some finishing touches seeing how it was very well tended to.

"Had your smell all over it, so I reckon you knew the person buried here. Was she human?" I continued and finally turned around to look at the boy that stood there, clearly sleep deprived and possibly upset about me being here. Some people disliked people being close to the graves of people they found dear. I already knew there was a *she* in his past and figured this had to be her.

"Because you aren't." I stated, smiled at his stunned expression.

"Yeah yeah... Monster. Abomination. People get kind of itchy when my eyes turn black. My body temperature is probably just around.. well.. a lot right now too. In times like these I can understand it when people say I'm not human, though really, I am. I'm just human plus something else." I explained calmly, made sure to make no sudden movements to keep the guy from making a run for it.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, finished his unspoken question from earlier. I blinked. He was taking the notion of my semi-inhumanity with surprising calmness.

"Good. You found your words, Leo. It is a nice grave this, even though it doesn't have the old letters written on it. Did you know? I can't read. Not these kinds of letters. Since I heard someone talk about this killer on a mission flier I decided to take it back then, but I can't... Only one thing. No, not my name. Fairy Tail. Only thing Uncle managed to pry into my thick skull, as he called it. I'm not very smart after all. Get lost a lot for starters. You too, it would seem." I explained. Okay, so I could read SOME things. Not many things. At times I was a very good listener too. Oh, and the pictures on most missions could speak quite well for the missions too.

"You know who I am?" Leo asked. He seemed surprised, but not overly shocked. He was too tired to truly be shocked. Poor boy.

"Aquarius didn't work too hard keeping that secret. After attempting to drown me, twice, after my stunt with Phantom Lord she told me. Not in clear words, of course, but I already knew some things from her occasional drunken tales when she broke up with her boyfriend. You're quite far from your home. How long have you stayed here without a contractor?" I said. Aquarius was back with her boyfriend now, but it had taken some heavy drinking to get there. And Leo had been mentioned. Or at least A Leo. And I had remembered a vague notion around my almost death after the tsunami. Aquarius had recognised him back them.

"Three years." he replied.

"Three.. THREE YEARS? Wow. That is. Remarkable. Got to hurt like.. a lot." I said. Then I got up from my squatting position, slowly. With my body going all freaky on me my muscles were complaining a lot, even after being healed up all nice and proper. Like running a marathon, and then perhaps having a building dropped on me. Perhaps several buildings.

"I AM a Celestial Mage, you know. It's my responsibility to help out when I can. Sure, my sense of direction is VERY bad, but leading you back to the stars... Not too hard doing that." I said matter-of-factly.

"I don't deserve salvation." he said.

"Not your call, is it?" I retorted.

"It's MY life." he said back, his voice stubborn. He was agitated, clearly, and I was losing some of my patience. Fire had a better hold of me in my current.. condition. And the fire was bringing emotions with it.

"And it's MY friend." I replied, equally stubborn. I was slowly approaching the guy calling himself Loke. Leo truly had been a trickster, even keeping his identity well hidden. Loke was a good name for him.

"Thought you didn't have friends. Besides, you don't even know what I did." he said. And I saw the look in his eyes. The look that said something had happened, and that he blamed himself for it. I closed in on him even further, stopped when I was right in front of him.

"Erza didn't exactly give me a choice regarding the friend thing, and even before that you're practically family. So, where's your key?" I asked, put an arm on his shoulder, making him grimace.

"You're burning up." he stated. His eyes were focused on my hands that probably weren't far from singing through his jacket.

"I know, now give me your key. You don't need to make a contract with me, I don't care about contracts, but I can send you back so you can be all better." I said.

"I'm exiled, Lucy. There is no going back." he retorted.

"Fine, so you want it done the hard way, eh? Great. I need to get this one out of the system anyways." I was referring to my little problem regarding the body temperature and my eyes. The Fever usually did pass after a few days, perhaps a good week if I was unlucky. In the meantime I would have to stay away from dry wood and general hot things. I did have a theory that I might be able to burn the excessive power off temporarily by using a different magic. Like Ice magic or Celestial magic. Just a theory, of course. It might also just empty my batteries and send me into a coma. Or death. Death was always an option.

"What are you talking about?" he asked. He did not understand. Of course he didn't. He did not know me very well, just as I did not know him very well.

"I'm opening your gate." I explained. I might as well test this one out right away.

"That's impossible." he tried changing my mind. Wimpy try. If he wanted to succeed he ought to try harder.

"I guess we'll find out." I replied, my smile kind of uncertain as a coughed up what might or might not be coal from undigested fish from earlier. I held back a groan. It was such a waste having such wonderful food go to waste like that.

"You'll DIE!" he yelled.

"I AM THE GATEKEEPER TO THE CELESTIAL WORLD.." I started yelling.

"No, don't.." he took a step towards me only to stop when I started glowing.

"GATE OF THE LION, LEO, I OPEN THEE!" I finished the incantation.

The sky was pretty, with its churning clouds and falling rain, wiping away my aches and pains for the moment. More like numbing them away, sure, but the point was they disappeared. Wait. Why was is dark? When did THAT happen? How long was I asleep? Oh well...

Leo the lion. Another link to Fairy Tail. Another being that led me towards this place. How strange was that? At least it ridded me of the tiny overdose I suffered from after unleashing too much fire. It would be some time until I could use that little trick again, but it would be for the best. For now.. I was Lucy Clive, the Celestial mage. A very tired and cold Celestial mage with some sleeping and eating to catch up on, but also a girl that had accomplished the intended goal with just a minor detail I hadn't accounted for. Yes, I got another Contract on my hand.

"Lucy!" a yell called out. My exhausted and confused mind recognised the voice as familiar, but I couldn't quite place it. I was too tired still for that.

"What is she DOING there?" another chimed in.

"Oi! You alright?" okay, NOW I recognised the voice. Gray. Gray Fullbuster. They came running while I lay on my back, my eyes closed and my face caressed by the falling water from far above. I opened my eyes to that, sat up while yawning loudly.

"Fine. Just tired. Weren't you guys heading for this bathing place?" I asked the lot of them where they stood. Gray. Natsu. Erza. Happy.

"That was hours ago." Natsu replied.

"Aye sir!"

"Have you seen Loke?"

"He just upped and left a few hours ago."

"We've been looking everywhere!" Natsu said. No offence to the boy, but his looking abilities were not of the best. So Loke had tried to leave Fairy Tail, eh? Leaving that guild was a lot harder than it seemed. I should know that better than many.

"Hold on. Calm down. I just woke up, my brain doesn't work too good yet." I held up a hand, yawned again. Sure, I could wake up pretty fast on my own, but when falling asleep in the rain, outside, most of my magic depleted, I needed a moment to get what they were saying.

"Okay. I went for a walk. Got lost. Went for a swim. fell down some waterfall, then went here to pay my respect to this grave. Then Loke showed up looking kind of tired, then.." I retraced the events of today.

"He was here?" Gray asked with urgency.

"Where is he now?" Erza asked.

"Calm down, I'm getting there. Uhm.. he needed some help with some things, and I helped him out. Then I fell asleep. Then you came." I ended. More like fell to the ground unconscious before my head hit grass, but that was just a minor detail. By the lack of ill response when I looked at them combined with the feeling of my cold skin I figured my theory checked out. Using my Celestial magic HAD sped up the process of burning the fever out of my system.

"So where IS he?" demanded Erza, and I looked at her.

"He's in the Spirit realm, of course. Where else?" I replied. Like DUH.

"WHAT?!" Gray exclaimed.

"You mean he's dead?" Natsu exclaimed.

"No. He's a Celestial Spirit. The Spirit realm is like home for him. He'll be back, after some rest." I explained. Like really. They knew this, right? With a groan I got up on my feet, managed to somehow unclench my hand that held a shiny, golden key with the insignia of the Zodiac spirit Leo. Also known as Loke.

"Look, here's his key and everything." I said.

Some brief explanations later, and I started following Natsu back to his home. The darkness made it sort of hard to see things, but we both had somewhat heightened senses, so we made due.

"You sure this is the right way?" I asked. He chuckled.

"Surer than you are." he replied, jumped over some ditch. I followed his lead and jumped over it too. I slipped unexpectedly due to the wet ground, but Natsu turned around in a flash, grabbed my hand and yanked me towards him so I avoided going into that pitch black hole. With my luck that hole might very well be bottomless.

"That doesn't mean much." I said, letting go of his hand as he started walking again. I heard Happy giggling above us, muttering something I didn't quite catch, other than a distinct rolling off his tongue.

"True. Didn't you live in a forest?" Natsu smiled and then asked.

"Yes. What's your point?" I said it while thinking about the odd question. Did he have a point to this?

"Well, how did you survive with your sense of direction?" he asked further. Good question. I asked myself about that frequently. There had been plenty of sticky situations and interesting adventures into areas I shouldn't have ventured into.

"Mama has a nice sense of direction, so she usually found me if I disappeared for too long. And besides, in the end it wasn't like I had a specific place I had to return too. Usually came over the village eventually when I wandered about enough." I explained. Especially since the main river passed by the place. Most rivers ended up in that river, though some of them took an underground route so I couldn't follow them by feet. The old man that was married to the woman that owned the cloth store usually sat by the riverside and would fish me up if I lost consciousness.

Finally we arrived at his house, home sweet home with a nice rancid smell and the fireplace soon burning nice and hot. I was sitting right in front of it when Natsu got out of the bathroom, smelling nice and clean.

"You alright, Lucy?" he asked as he stopped in the door leading to the bathroom.

"Sure, a bit cold is all." I replied and turned to him. He lifted a brow at me but said nothing else as he headed to the kitchen area only wearing a towel around his waist. He had grown used to my presence pretty early on and now acted as if I had lived there always.

"That food isn't edible anymore." I said as he smelled the pan on the stove. It was a week old, if not older. I could smell the smell of food poisoning all the way to my sitting spot.

"How do you know before you've tried?" he asked, and I sighed. He got a nose on him, didn't he?

"You know North from South yet your nose doesn't pick up on the rotting food? Okay, you know what? I'll make a meal." I got up, headed to the kitchen area and removed the food from his sight, tossed it in the trash before he could think of eating it.

"What kind of food do we have here?" I asked as I looked about in search for some kind of edible.. somethings.

"We have fish!" Happy said and held a fish up to me. When did he get back?

"Fair enough. Give 'em and I'll cook something up..." I said. During this whole time I hadn't cooked a single meal. While I found my cooking skills limited it couldn't be much worse than this guy. Sure, he could cook something up, but since he remained pretty omnivorous he didn't necessary care what he put in the pan in the first place, plus the fact that Mira would feed him decent meals so he didn't actually HAVE to cook too much for himself.

"I didn't know you could cook." Natsu praised in between bites, happily devouring the food I had prepared. Wow. I'd fried fish. That was my skill. The frying pan had added the extra flavour, of that I was certain. The magic of frying pans was not to be underestimated.

"Mama goes on hunting trips all the time, and the nice old man couldn't always feed me." I explained.

"Nice old man?" Natsu questioned.

"From the village. It isn't important. Like you said, I get lost a lot and frying food isn't too hard." and with that I curled up next to the guy while he ate, sitting in the sofa, and allowed myself to drift off.

"Hey, Happy. You get it?" the boy asked his cat partner, and the blue feline smiled, held up the paper in question while his eyes sparkled with mischief. The grin that lit up the face of the Dragon Slayer was nothing short of brilliant. He was about to share the good news with his other partner when he realised she was long since lost in the dreamworld, only leaning on him since he had technically been eating the meal in her bed. He'd tell her in the morrow. In her sleeping state she snuggled up closer, muttering something utterly incoherent and then lay still again, her breath even and relaxed.

"She lllllikes you," Happy rolled his tongue and Natsu surprised the cat by chuckling lightly and rolling his eyes.

"You've been listening in on Macao again haven't you." he said, and the feline nodded.

"Farther farther up and down, chase the nasty monster down. Monsters murder, monsters lie, therefore monsters need to die." both the males turned to look at the girl that out of nowhere started singing that verse in a childish melody the boy had heard before, the melody she had been muttering when she showed up at the shore, beaten to a pulp by what she called northerners. What kind of song was that? He also remembered the villagers that had called her those names. Vampire. Why would they believe her to be that? They had called her a monster too. And they threw rocks... And Lucy seemed to just accept that as something completely normal. She sure was weird.


	17. Destroy the Moon?

"Where am I?" I muttered while looking about. I had fallen asleep on the couch, like usual, only accompanied by a nearly naked Natsu and Happy, the cat that loved fish more than anything and somehow had a very large amount stocked away. Somewhere. The part about Natsu being almost naked wasn't too usual, but the rest was. Okay, so Natsu was scarcely dressed quite often, but not THAT scarcely dressed.

This wasn't their place, though. I wasn't even sure this was Magnolia. Further along, Natsu was sleeping in the bed next to me. We had one bed each, and the place looked neat, as if being cleaned way too often. A hotel room, perhaps? No one replied, since they were, well, sleeping, so I got up instead, moved over to his bed and poked the boy that might've kidnapped me.

"Natsu... Natsu! Where am I?" I asked, and he groaned due to my pointy finger that I kept stabbing into his arm. He opened his eyes. After a few seconds of mindless staring he grinned, sat up.

"You're awake!" he exclaimed.

"Yeah. I am. Now, where am I?" how many times did I need to repeat that line before I got my answer?

"Hargeon. You wouldn't know..." he said, making me feel sort of insulted. Only sort of, though. I wasn't all that good with names after all. But THIS one, surprisingly, I DID know.

"What, you mean the place where supposedly some Salamander was spotted? What are we doing here?" I asked.

"Wait, you KNOW this place?" he seemed VERY surprised over to the fact that I knew the name of the town. Somewhat understandable, but I HAD been lost a few times. Even though I had little knowledge as to how to get to places, I did catch up on a few names every now and then. Just a few, though. It was a lucky coincidence really that led me to remember this name in particular. That, and quite a few things had happened during my stay her, albeit the shortness of it.

"I hit a lot of small towns on my way to Fairy Tail, you know, before I thought of taking the train. I mean, I kind of wanted to avoid trains since Father owns too many of them. Not like I wanted him to find out I was returning to Fiore, 'cause I didn't believe him to be all forgiving after everything..." I trailed off. That was an embarrassing tale in itself.

"Anyways, I got to this town, I was starving and then got a whiff of someone claiming that this Salamander was in town. At first I though, hey, a dragon looks like a salamander. But why would a dragon meet up in a town, right? Then there was word about it being a Fairy Tail mage." I continued. I had of course sought the guy out right away, since Fairy Tail rang a bell. A creep of a guy that had quite an amount of girls.. I think swooning was the right word.. over him. He smelled funny too, but not funny in a good way.

"But that was a lie too. He promised me food, so I went with him, but then he tried making me go on this boat." I added. Boats didn't really agree with me. It was the whole ordeal with me not being able to swim. And when I didn't even know the strange guy that seemed obviously surprised over the fact that I wasn't following him around like some puppy-dog, I saw no point in tempting fate any more than necessary. I mean, did Magnolia even HAVE a dock? If I had to swim to shore I was pretty much screwed. So I'd thanked the guy but declined. That would be when things turned ugly.

"I was here too, actually... I was on that boat." Natsu said, turning green as he recalled the incident. Transportation. Probably his sole nemesis. So he'd been on the boat, huh. I hadn't. Sure, there was food there, but still, I declined.

"Oh... sorry about the.. wave, then. Aquarius was kind of pissy after the guy tried drowning me." I apologised. The guy calling himself Salamander had tried to drug me. Then he'd tried to drown me. Since Aquarius was on a date at the time it had ended up with some random fisherman that had rescued my sorry ass and brought me to a hotel by the dock. Strange how there always was a fisherman nearby to rescue me. Then again, there were quite an amount of fishermen in existence. Aquarius got the news later and somehow managed to summon herself and make a wave that caused the ship the man had tried to make me board to crash back onto the shore.

"Aquarius? YOU made that wave?" and Natsu probably didn't know what Aquarius was capable of. After all, he'd never really met her. He might not even know who she was, now when I thought about it.

"Aquarius did. She usually does what she wants. She didn't tell me much except the fact that the false Salamander got what he deserved. I only woke up in a burning building and had to make a run for it. Not because of the burning part though. There was this guy calling ME Salamander all of a sudden. Now when I think about it they might've thought me to be that fire mage with me being on fire and all after running out of that building. Anyways, eventually I ended up at some train station. When I found out I could take the train to Magnolia I hopped on. That's when I met you." I corrected him, and continued my tale. Yes, Hargeon had been eventful. And sort of infuriating. I still remembered my little rant about that man calling me Salamander and demanding me to pay for the damage even though I clearly hadn't been the one to start that fire. At least not that time.

"That might've been me, starting that fire..." Natsu admitted, bringing me back from my musings. I guess that made sense, though I couldn't see why he started it. Strange. Natsu did start a lot of fires though. Like the one at Evarloo. And the one at the construction site that at this point was the all but finished guild.

"Oh. Thought someone might want to burn me to death, not knowing that it wouldn't work. Might be Father, he never knew about Igneel.. but all that aside, what are we doing here?" and back to where we started. What WERE we doing here?

"Mission." Natsu stated simply. Mission, huh? Made sense.

"What kind?" I asked, suspicious as to why the boy had chosen to apparently carry me all the way here while I remained asleep. It meant trouble when he did that. But even without trouble, we usually ended up in a tight spot anyways. I might've not accompanied the guy on TOO many missions, but his knack for trouble was astounding. It rivalled even my own ability to attract it.

"An S-rank mission!" he declared with the brightest smile ever. Okay. An S-rank mission. What was an S-rank mission? Didn't know. Something fancy, I figured.

"What does it involve?" I asked. I saw no point in asking too many questions. His smile told me the mission meant a lot to him, so.. why not, right? We were partners, and this might very well be what partners did. At least since I was HIS partner.

"A curse. It's to lift a curse on an island called Galuna." he said. A curse. That could become interesting, and fast. Depended of the nature of the curse, of course. Some curses weren't all that bad. Who was I kidding, ALL curses were bad. Some of them weren't outright gruesome would be a more accurate description.

"You any good with curses?" I asked. When dealing with curses, people usually brought at least one person with them that had some knowledge regarding them. That flute at Clover Town had supposedly been cursed. THAT particular one had been solvable through blunt force, true, but most curses demanded some level of intellectuality. Unless the literacy demanded involved runes I could pretty much count me out. If the curse involved letters at all, that is.

"I say we fight whatever caused the curse and then see what happens. It's an S-rank mission! If we succeed we can become S-rank mages!" Natsu exclaimed and thus told me with his entire being that no. No, he wasn't really that familiar with curses. I wasn't even sure he knew the meaning of the word. It only spelled out as bad to him and in his little world bad could be beaten up until it turned good. That would be the general motto of the whole of Fairy Tail. Yeah...

"Aye!" the cat had woken up, agreed with his friend. Sounded like an idea. Head on. Not any plan B should we fail. I thought about it for a full thirty seconds.

"Fair enough. Why do I have a feeling that Erza will skin us alive if she catches us?" I decided to go on this quest with him. Was I any good with curses? Not really, no, but I had encountered a few every once in a while. But then there was Erza. The nature of our arrival at Hargeon reeked of not being exactly legit.

"Because she will." he replied and thus confirmed my thoughts. Well. Okay. If the curse didn't off us, she would see to that.

"Double threat then. There's no time to waste." I said. And with that we got up, left the hotel room and headed for the docks.

"I've been here before..." I muttered as we entered the village, looked about and searching for any familiar faces. I was better with faces than with names. The doors were wide open, practically invited the four of us in. Yes, Gray had found us. We'd kidnapped him too. Of course he was awake now. He was not too happy with the recent development.

"Lucy-nee!" came the yell before I got assaulted by two purple, winged creatures that efficiently knocked me to the ground. Aha... I knew I knew this place from somewhere. The butchers wife back in the village once told me to go back to Galuna to the other demons. Mama hit her through three consecutive buildings for saying it. The woman survived. It was an old tale in my village. Galuna, the nest of lessor demons. THIS was the cursed island? What would curse demons? What would be ABLE to curse demons? They had resistance against curses and other kinds of magic that exceeded that of normal humans. Much like dragons, really.

"What are you doing back here, little Northern girl?" a voice asked, belonging to one of the people I knew as elders. Well, he was technically THE elder, or the chief in the village. For the life of me I couldn't recall his name. To answer his question I held my hand up and showed off my Fairy Tail mark while I remained on the ground, still buried under the two demons that now also were accompanied by others. I hoped he could see my hand. Natsu showed off his mark too, and Gray lifted up his t-shirt, knowingly this time, to show his affiliation with the guild.

"There was a curse?" I uttered, a bit muffled under all the bodies.

"Curse? Ah, the curse... There is none." the old man laughed, dragged his clawed fingers through his beard while the the two boys stared at the man in disbelief. In the meantime I managed to sit up, and noticed quite a few new faces amongst the people hugging me. Young ones. Children that were too young to ever having met me. They still smiled brightly at me as if I was an old accomplice of theirs.

"Why did you send a request then?" I asked while Natsu was off in a corner sulking, Gray with him, seemingly grey clouds gathering above them.

"Ah, it was a misunderstanding, little Northern girl. It was all cleared up a little while ago after that incident where the ground shook terribly. The fellow that explained it all to us should be around here somewhere... Hm. Oh, there he is!" I looked at the point his finger showed me, and there he was, in another corner, the stranger, sulking while drawing patterns in the ground, much like the fellows I had arrived with.

He looked outright depressed, with his white hair and pale skin, only.. only clad in his underpants. It couldn't be... Could it? The boy was muttering something under his breath, unaware of the new arrivals. Actually, when I looked closer, there were others with him. Two more boys, and a girl next to.. a giant mouse? They were a while away, in a far corner.

"Say... that boy over there, what's his name?" I asked the Chief, and he shrugged.

"Don't remember." he said, didn't seem overly interested in recalling it either. Then he went on about how he should throw a party to celebrate the destruction of the moon and the return of the mermaid, and others started talking about it with him. I had NO idea what he was going on about, but locked my gaze on the white haired boy that now unconsciously started tugging on his last remaining piece of clothing. Now that behaviour definitely rang some bells.

"Yo! ICE BOY!" I yelled and two heads raised from their little mushroom farm on the ground. One would be named Gray Fullbuster, but at the moment he didn't interest me nearly as much as the boy with the white hair. Now THAT.. had to be fate.

"Give me a moment, guys..." I managed to untangle myself from the demons that surrounded me, made a run for it towards the boy I had never thought I'd find. Firstly, he had gone off the grid for a long time. No one had seen nor heard from him. Yet here he was. Well. Hopefully it was him, or this might become awkward. I jumped him swiftly just as he stood, unsure what he was readying himself for, and the impact made us both fall to the ground.

"Lyon Vastia." a miracle I knew his name. A sheer miracle.

"Who're you?" came the reply, sort of strangled since he probably got the air knocked out of him upon impact with the ground. I got up, grabbed his arm and yanked him up before I decided to reply.

"I'm Lucy. I knew Ur." I said, smiling widely at him. The mention of her name made him turn back to a depressed, muttering fool that squatted on the ground and drew circles in the dirt. The boys sure were moody today. All of them. Only Happy seemed unaffected, something that probably was thanks to the fish one of the village women had offered him.

"Your brother's here, y'know. Gray's here." I said, cocked my head to the side as I watched the dark thing in front of me. The change was instant. He got up, had a determent glare replacing the depressed grimace.

"Where?" he demanded to know and I turned my head, brought a hand up to my mouth in order to increase the sound.

"Yo! Gray Fullbuster! Your brother Lyon wants to see you!" I yelled, and one of the dark figures from the other corner of depression got up, fully dressed one second, topless the other. He really needed to do something about that habit of his.

"Lyon!" came the surprised yell.

"How was I supposed to know they didn't get along?" I asked the village chief as we sat in the middle of the village, surrounded by walls on all sides, enjoying the feast they had prepared for the celebration after the destruction of the moon. And the return of the Mermaid. I could clearly see the moon up above us so the notion didn't really make sense to me, but according to the girl with the mouse it had involved some kind of giant glass magnifier.

I chose to accept her explanation though I understood even less after she told me this. Giant glass magnifier. What could that possibly have to do with the destruction of the moon that clearly was not broken? I did not know, and I had a feeling that whatever extended explanation any of these people had to offer would end up being meaningless babble. So I didn't inquire any further explanation.

The surrounding village was ruined. Due to the glass magnifier deal? No. Apparently Lyon and Gray hadn't seen each other in a while, and they hadn't separated as friends. A fight ensued. A large fight. The demons in the village were as forgiving as ever though and still prepared a banquet which we all now attended, friend and foe alike. It was like feasting in the middle of a glacier, ice surrounding us on all sides despite the summer breeze that blew warm and summery. Gray and Lyon was there too, albeit situated on opposite sides of the feasting site.

"Lucy-nee, come and play!" a little child took hold of my hand and dragged me off. Skipping ropes. Skipping ropes while singing a song with a very familiar melody.

"Farther farther up and down, they are chasing monsters down.

Murder monsters, makes us lie, tells us monsters need to die." well that sounded familiar, yet different. From the perspective of a monster, I suspected. They were demons. Some called demons monsters and vice versa.

"Up the mountain road we live, on the forest floor we sleep.

If you come upon us once, we will throw a giant feast." That was definitely different, but seemingly fitted. Throw a feast, huh.

"They have pitchforks, they have guns, they have fire, makes us run.

Farther farther all around, they are hunting monsters down.

Murder monsters, makes us lie, tells us monsters need to die." they spotted me where they stood, waved me in, and soon I ended up on rope duty. Hold the rope. Make it swing. People would jump over the rope, over and over again, singing the song of monsters until they failed to jump over the rope. What a funny game they were playing. And odd. Who would ever thing of making this a game?

"WHAT is going on here?!" came a firm voice, sounding throughout the area, making people stop eating as all eyes turned to look at a positively furious woman clad in metal. Erza Scarlet had caught up with us at last as Gray initially had warned us about before we knocked him unconscious and dragged him with us on the mission instead. We might die now. At least our ending had not been by the hands of some gruesome curse, though Erza might challenge some curses on the gruesome part.

"Ah.. eh, Erza. This.. this isn't what it looks like?" Natsu tried, visibly sweating as he had arrived at the same conclusion as me. And what DID this look like? And why phrase it as a question?

"Is that a friend of yours, Lucy-nee?" asked one of the children that had been skipping rope. I think that was what they called it. I had of course stopped moving that rope by now so the girl, her skin spotty and dark blue, was tugging my shirt. I was about to correct her, tell the little one that I had no friends, when I once again remembered the declaration.

"She is. That is Erza Scarlet, one of the strongest mages I have ever met!" I answered instead, and the woman with the scarlet hair turned to me. Had she heard me by any chance?

"You know these.. people, Lucy?" I noticed the slight pause at people but ignored it as I nodded.

"I've been here before. A long time ago." I replied, and she furrowed her brows.

"Didn't you say you had never set foot in Fiore before you left your village?" she asked and I nodded in reply.

"True. Didn't know this place belonged to any country at the time. How did I get here again... Was it the barrel incident?" I mused to myself, and an older girl shook her head. She had a rectangular nose and skin that was green in different shades. She also had lovely, purple eyes.

"Nope." she said.

"The stranded ship?" I tried again.

"No." the girl with the dark blue skin said. Ah.. that was the abandoned island.

"That time I got eaten by a whale?" third times a charm? Wasn't that a saying. At least I tried, right?

"Wrong again, Lucy-nee. You get lost a lot, don't you." the little girl laughed. If none of those were correct then what was?

"Not THAT often. But if it wasn't one of THOSE incidents... Couldn't have been the wyverns, they usually stay in the mountains. Or the Vulcans, they're not too fond of the coast. None of the river incidents. Hm.. AH, I remember! It was the giant seagull! I got taken by a giant seagull and dropped in the ocean around here somewhere and got caught in one of your fishing nets!" I declared happily, and some of the village women laughed at me. I didn't understand why, but if they were having a good time then I wasn't one to complain. A large BINGO came from the older girl that had been correcting me earlier.

"Hence why we called her a mermaid the first time we met her. Her mother personally traveled all the way out her in order to bring her back home, the poor thing. The Little Northern girl went on quite a few adventures during her stay though, got lost more times than we can even count. Lost Lucy, the little Mermaid, or the little Northern girl. That's the nicknames she got around here," an older woman explained. I'd forgotten about that. There was a temple around here, wasn't there? I remembered going there and getting lost within its walls. Demons could not venture there, so it had been a while before I found myself back in the village.

"How often have you gotten lost at sea?" Gray asked in surprise, and I shrugged.

"The old man by the river that passed by my village didn't always catch me in time. Mama knows a lot of people though, so it usually ended well. She knows these people too." I replied, and the village chief nodded.

"How is your mother these days?" the Chief asked.

"She's out hunting," I replied nonchalantly and for a moment all the demons stopped in their movements before everything went back to normal.

"Ah, I see. So you got lost and ended up with these fellows, did you? They seem like nice folks, but if you ever end up in any trouble then know that your friends on Galuna always will welcome you." he said, smiled fondly at me, much like the man that used to stay by the river. He was a nice man, err, demon. The village Chief, I mean. Not the man fishing by the river. HE was quite human, at least as far as I knew. I hadn't actually been able to identify his corpse after my village died, but there had been an extensive amount of unidentifiable bodies back then.

"No, I actually went looking for Fairy Tail. I'm planning to stay for a while too." I corrected the Village Chief, and he nodded, held up a key. A golden key. Zodiac. Those keys were rare. Why did the old man..err.. demon have one of those?

"That's good to hear, little Lost Lucy. Greet that mother of yours the next time you see her, eh? I will do the same for you and tell her where you are if she doesn't already know. The gods know that woman needs the help she can get when looking for her little Lost girl." he said, and held the key out to me.

"Mhm." I agreed, and the feast continued as I received the key, the intended reward for the mission that didn't really exist. I didn't know before now that the key was an intended reward, but the Chief was quite insistent on me having it so I thanked him and clicked the key to my keychain before I hid it in the pocket of my shorts. I would contact the Spirit later on in order to make a contract.

Somehow we managed to make Erza forget her mission of vengeance for a while until Natsu eventually managed to convince her that we hadn't technically done anything wrong, only visited some old friends. Our death sentences were if nothing else temporarily held back.

"Ah, my dear Princess, your prince Charming has arrived!" a voice called out and to my surprise Loke made an appearance at some point during the late stages of the feast we soon would be leaving since the pirates Erza had hijacked on her way here and that had their ship docked right next to the island and that also had ended up here had business to attend to in not too long.

His appearance was brief, confusing and perhaps a bit annoying not to speak of borderline awkward since I at the time had been on my way to the bathroom. He left me with some tickets before he disappeared and I was standing there, none the wiser, with some pieces of paper that apparently would earn me and some friends a free weekend at some kind of fancy resort. Whatever that was. I would have to ask Erza. She knew this kind of stuff. He HAD taken his time to translate the tickets magically though so they were spelled out in runes. At least he told me so.

He also declared his love for me in a really strange manner and with this really odd expression plastered on his face, oddly similar to the one he bore when he first introduced himself. Did that same expression have something to do with his nickname as a Playboy, or the fact that a lot of girls seemed to be awing over him much like those that had followed the fake Salamander in Hargeon? I did not know.

I returned to my fellow Fairy Tail members none the less, forced a shirt on Gray and stopped the fist of Natsu on its way to the Ice Mages face before the two of them could get themselves killed by the sneakily approaching Erza. I did not usually mind them fighting since I knew that boys tended to fight a lot. Fairy Tail mages tended to fight a lot too, so the boys were doubly inflicted by the urge to smash each others faces. Anyways.. the reason I stopped them was not due to a sudden strike of pacifism, nor was it to save their life from the wrath of the redhead. Her beating the crap out of them was a ritual I had grown used to a while ago and that oft recurred several times a day whenever the three of them gathered. No, I broke them apart in order to show them the tickets.

And apparently I needed to get a bikini. Or Erza might kill me.


	18. The Tower of Heaven

During some feast on an island of Lesser Demons Loke the Lion Spirit had emerged and handed me tickets to a seemingly awesome place. A resort, whatever that was. After showing the tickets to those other people there I had been told that a resort was an awesome place that would be a lot of fun. Didn't explain too much, but we would be going there. And Erza REALLY wanted to go shopping with me for some swimwear. I did not want swimwear. I did not wear swimwear.

Earlier there had been the whole issue with not being able to swim, but there were other reasons. Reasons I didn't want to talk too much about, but that Natsu due to some unfortunate circumstances knew parts of. Not that he had told anyone. I appreciated that. Truly. But back to the point. I did not want swimwear, particularly the kind Erza had in mind, the kind that would leave my back all but completely exposed.

We still went shopping. We laughed. Tried on silly things. Bought useless trinkets. I almost forgot myself. Who I was. What I was. My true nature was etched into my very body. MONSTER. And soon I was reminded of why that was.

AT THE RESORT

It was in the middle of the hall. A great hall. Might've been what referred to as a casino. At least once upon a time. This would be the resort Loke had given me tickets to. The very resort I had gone to together with Erza Scarlet, Natsu Dragneel, Happy and Gray Fullbuster. The place that supposedly should be a lot of fun.

Make it go away make it go away make it go away MAKE IT GO AWAY!

I screamed again, buckled over as I lay, and they ran. Or they had been running, those other people that had filled the casino hall. They were long gone by now, and that would be for the best.

Not THEM of course. Not those that shared my brand as a Fairy Tail member. Not them, for they did not run, did not know what running was from the very beginning and would probably not be running even if they had known. They were off somewhere, dealing with whatever they needed to deal with, as I needed to deal with.. this.

*There is no such thing as freedom*

I had lost control. Completely. Too many emotions, too many things I preferred leaving in the dark. And since I was no longer in control, my flames were no longer in control, and they were rampant. The glass dome over the casino was cracking up due to the heat though not yet at the breaking point, the smoke already making it hard to see. Please no.

You are dead. Leave me alone. I gave you a grave.

"Leave her, she's lost control." someone said. A male.

"But.." another protested. A female voice.

"Forget it. You can't even get close to her like that.." another male said.

Voices. Voices of those that had arrived and attacked unexpectedly. One had even shot me. I decided to cover my ears so I didn't get to hear their voices. Voices I knew. Voices I wanted to forget. Make it go AWAY!

The next scream was filled with agony, because it hurt. Like reliving THAT day. The day... Suddenly I looked up to see those that were about to depart. They had not taken me, though the cat girl hesitated to leave. She wanted to approach. They had tried to take Erza, though she had freed herself. Why did they try to take Erza? Hard to breathe. The smoke felt like poison, and the fire was growing vibrantly white as the heat reached new heights. Hard to breathe. Almost as if I was back in that bathroom while poisonous flames licked the walls and Hope screamed in the bathtub.

"MILLIANNA!" I yelled, tears streaming down my face, evaporating almost instantly. Suddenly all flames slowed, and I managed to get up. She stopped, the cat girl, sending me a long look.

"Murderer." she hissed as her face twisted in a hateful grimace, and she was gone. Murderer. Murderer.

*There is no such thing as freedom*

A bathroom filled to the brink with blood, a figure standing up in it, pointing at me.

*Murderer*

*Murderer*

*There is no such thing as freedom*

My eyes widened, and finally the glass dome exploded into a myriad of broken, razor sharp and huge pieces of glass. I... I... Some pieces hit me, but I did not care.

*Please kill me*

No. I don't want to. I didn't mean to. I walked towards the balcony where the beings had escaped from, my bare feet crunching against all that which was broken, colouring the ground red. My right hand was raised as if reaching out. As if that would somehow halt those that had left. No.

"LUCY!" the yell of the Salamander could be heard, and I turned my head to see, though my legs kept bringing me closer to the place where she had been standing. Millianna. Why was she here? Why would he..? Natsu stopped when he saw the rampage, the fire that erased all that got too close, white and deadly and then me, still clad in that white dress Erza had picked out for me after I had managed to refuse the bikini she tried forcing me to buy. It was in tatters, black burn marks making an appearance together with the red that came from the inside.

"I.." I began, my eyes wide and filled with silently falling tears.

"Please get away." I said in a relatively calm voice. I could see Erza standing some ways away. She was shocked too, as much due to those that had been here as she was with me. She knew them. How did she know them? Why did she know them? Why did they try to take her with them? Why where they here?

"Come on." Natsu continued, started running towards me. No. Don't come closer.

"STAY AWAY!" I shrieked, the air surrounding me exploding in another fit of uncontrollable flames. The pressure from the explosion took him off his feet.

I remembered when I first showed him my flames.

My flames are dying, and they make everything around me die. I do not wish to end you. That had been my words. At the time he had not heeded the warning, and he had approached me regardlessly. And I had allowed him to. Briefly. We were friends. At some point we were friends, and like that I suddenly felt less alone. But then again. My flames are dying. They make everything around me die. My village. My sister. Everything that I touched died.

If he came any closer, that Natsu Dragneel of Fairy Tail, he would meet the same fate as everything else that had made contact with my flames. And the world needed someone like him. Someone vibrant, someone tough as nails and someone who would stick up to his friends at any given time.

The world did not need the likes of me. Millianna had called me a murderer. So she knew. She had heard. Of course she had. She was Millianna. Excellent hearing. I reached the balcony, and moved my gaze outwards. That vast ocean.

"You will pay for what you did..." a whisper sounded, and suddenly a rope twisted itself around my arms, and I felt a strong jolt, dragging me from solid ground and towards that which I knew to await me in that general direction, even if my sense of direction sucked. It had to be THAT place. *There is no such thing as freedom* That place had claimed that. Over and over again in order to make them docile. To make us docile. To make HER docile. Hope. The very first person to ever claim that I was her friend.

THAT PLACE

"Well well well, what have we here? I sent you out to get Erza Scarlet, not Lucy White. Thought you were dead," that last one the boy directed at me. The boy with the blue hair, one I had met in the fields sometimes but that lived in some other cell. Before he took over, that is. Before he became the leader of this place.

"Fate sure works in odd ways, don't you think? You may leave now, Millianna. Little Lucy and I have much to talk about." he continued.

"Sorry for not bringing Erza, Jellal, she had a lot of people helping" she said back, and the boy smiled.

"She will come, so just leave for now." he said. Such confidence. He had always had a thing with confidence. I heard the door close, though I did not look. Chained to the wall. Such.. familiarity.

"Now, Lucy White, why is it so that you are around Erza, eh? Haven't you learned yet?" he began, paced in front of my restrained form.

"Haven't you learned what this place taught you?" he kept asking, and I kept staring at him. Kept staring because I had nothing to answer with. No self defence.

"You shouldn't stay close to people. After all, they tend to die. Just like Hope. Just like all the people in your cell. None of them are alive, are they." he continued. I stopped looking at him, looked ahead instead since looking at him served too much as a reminder. Those were days I did not wish to recall.

"And those that don't die, they don't want you. Your uncle stopped believing, your Father stopped believing, your Mother stopped believing. Even Zeref himself rejected you, no matter how much they tried. Lucy White, also called Lucy Black. Lucy Death. Cursed Lucy. And then you went and did THAT too. Murder." and Jellal stopped. He stopped pacing, stood right in front of me and forced my chin down so I looked straight at him.

"All for the sake of freedom, though freedom is an illusion. There is no such thing as freedom. Because of your betrayal I can't let you off the hook you know. Millianna despises you. Everyone despises you. If those people from that guild ever finds out the truth.. they will despise you too." he said in a sugary sweet voice.

OUTSIDE THE HALL

It was silent for a while. Millianna stood there, just outside the door, waiting for the moment to come. The moment she had been waiting for. Not the silence. What came after. There was a sound of explosion. Then, there it was. An agonising shriek as Lucy White faced the consequence of her actions. She left then. It would be long until the shrieks ceased, Lucy was one to last, but not forever. Jellal would see to that.


	19. Lucy White

I grew up in the North, just outside the borders of a small village. Not the biggest of places, but filled with men, women, children and animals such as a village ought to be. I was the kid of the crazy lady, the two of us moving up there when I was very young still. I remembered the very first magic I ever performed, a pitiful attempt of Ice Magic that Ur taught me that one time we met, all those years ago.

I remembered how odd it felt to use magic, how fitting it was. Maybe was that tiny little surge what finally unlocked what power I held within.

I remembered the first time I lost it. I remembered my aching back and the utter terror when the children hung me up in a tree while singing the song of monsters. My song. I didn't get it yet, back then. I knew my mother was different, called the dragon lady as she was, but I didn't know... yet. But I would.

When I came to I was broken. My body was just.. broken. It felt like someone had been hammering me constantly all over, fracturing ribs and rupturing organs. Okay, so the rupturing of organs hadn't really struck me at the time since I was too young to know much about the innards of people, but I felt badly beaten up. And as I sat up, I noted that the forest that had once stood tall and old around me was gone, replaced by black ash and coal and embers. And next to me he lay, the very boy that had etched what he claimed to be my true name upon my back. A name I had failed to see before just then.

The boy was dead. His rusty knife was imbedded in my chest, and I remembered seeing the multiple stab wounds covering my front. He had tried to kill me, and now he was dead. Burned to death. I remembered how I had panicked, how I had crawled up to him shook his charred remains and yelling weakly for him to wake up, all the while coughing up what I later would realize was blood due to severe inner bleeding.

I remembered the look Mother gave me when she found the two of us. She had helped me bury him, and we never spoke of him again, but after getting rid of his body she had told me about the great magic that lay within me, and how I ought to be more careful around regular humans, as she called them. Mama doesn't like humans too much, but I know she disapproved of what I had done even without any reprimand ever passing her lips. People in the village didn't know, but somehow they knew that something was up. People avoided me like never before. I had passed the invisible line into a sort of maturity that no longer would grant me forgiveness.

I took to going on more adventures, adventures that brought me farther away than I had been before. I could swim still back then, so I wasn't in real danger most of the time. There was the Galuna incident for instant. That was fun times. Times that made me forget that I before reaching the age of ten already would be considered a murderer.

I remembered my second Incident. It happened while Mama was away on one of her hunting trips, and I was attacked by Wyverns, those that despised my very smell due to my daddy, the dragon named Igneel. Mama had started telling stories of him now, and she seemed genuinely happy when talking about him though she never brought up why he wasn't around other than the same old reason. They had a fight long ago, and had split up to never see each other again.

I remembered the man that found me like that, close to death as I were with my Mother at the moment nowhere to be found. I remembered him taking me, and bringing me.. to this place. This hell.

I remembered being brought back to health. Then they attempted to tame me. Tried making me work. But every time they brought me to the brink of death an Incident would occur. Another blast, another fight against the child that during the Incident would possess strength that many refused to believe to be true. Every time I misbehaved I would be brought to a room where I would feel unbearable pain while people chanting Zeref stayed nearby. But this Zeref, whoever or whatever it might be, never came. So I was locked in a dungeon, and I was given a new task. Murderer.

People would be convinced that what awaited in that deep pit to be a monster. Should they be able to defeat it, they would be free to go. But how could they defeat a child of a dragon?

I tried reasoning in the beginning. Tried stopping them. But for everyone I was what was carved into my bare back that was revealed for all to see as they ascended into my personal cave with a torch and a choice of weapon. Reasoning with a monster would lead to nothing. That was common knowledge. So they charged, and they slashed, and they almost defeated me. Then I would lose it. Whenever I came to my wounds would be tended to and there would be food waiting. As if to tell me that I had done a good job. I had brought the end to another human being.

I raised nameless graves for those first nameless ones, and then I got a new habit. Instead of asking the ones that arrived to stop, I asked for their names. Names that I could carve upon the graves to come.

I do not know how long I remained down there, in the dark, waiting for another to come and challenge me. But one day.. one day that changed. It changed the day HE came down. I had heard faint ruckus from the surface, and then a boy had entered my dungeon where I was held.

"What is your name?" I asked tiredly, and his smile had been wicked.

"I hear you are the Monster of this place." he said. I was sitting in my nest of sorts made of skins and feathers from the live animals they at times sent down to me for food.

"So they say. Now tell me the name so I can get this over with." I stated again.

"Why do you need my name?" he asked. His voice was awfully calm compared to most others that had walked through those doors. Even the braves usually sported a slight trembling in their voice. Not this one though. Nor was he armed, I noted. He only held his torch.

"So I have something to write on your grave." I replied equally calm, and lifted an arm to point. He looked, and spotted the variety of names carved into the stony surface of small rocks. Names of those that had fallen for the beast I held within.

"You're going to try and kill me?" he asked while looking at my graveyard, a sort of amusement in his voice.

"Usually it is the other way around." I commented dryly and got up on my feet. I was wearing a black bikini top and a pair of torn shorts, this to reveal my number of battle-scars that already had faded partly. Some were already gone. It was the one on the back that remained. Why it remained I didn't know, but it did. As if telling me the reality behind the brand. I walked closer, then stopped a few paces away.

"Give me your name, then come at me. I'm hungry, so we might as well get this over with." I said.

"What, you eat all those people you have named there?" he asked, the boy. He sure was strange. Why would people eat people? He might not consider me human but surprisingly few things actually ate humans.

"No. They try to kill me. They fail. Then I get food. Chicken. Goat. The occasional sheep or cow." I explained. He laughed then. He actually laughed.

"I'm not here to fight you. You seem useful enough. Come with me, I will give some nicer accommodation." he said, and then turned his back to me, started heading for the strangely enough still open door. Usually the guards would close it firmly behind the new challenger, to keep both of us from attempting to take our leave.

"What?" I asked, stared at the door. Was he messing with me? Why would he let me out? Why would anyone let me out? I was a murderer. If I were him I would not let me out.

"Are you coming?" he asked, standing in the doorway. I stared at him, wide eyed and hesitant. It had to be a trap. But what kind of trap would it be? Why?

"Suit yourself." he shrugged and left the room, the light disappearing gradually along with him. The door remained open. It took me a few moments before I managed to make my legs obey me again.

"Wait!" I yelled and set off running towards the door, through it as I had dreamt so many times, and swiftly caught up with the boy and his torch. He smiled when I stopped running and kept his pace behind me, keeping a safe distance but still remaining close enough so that I wouldn't lose him.

"My name is Jellal, by the way. Jellal Fernandez. I am the new leader of this place," he said. Jellal? I was no good with names, really, but I'd remember his.

"Ah. Okay. Nice to meet you, Jellal." I mumbled.

"So what's your name?" he asked. His gaze was fixed forward, but I heard him.

"I'm Lucy. Lucy.. White." I said. Mama had told me not to use my last name unless I had to, so I had called myself that when they first asked me what my name was.

"Okay, Lucy. I'm afraid I can't give you the fully upgraded kind of accommodation for now, but you will be given more food and a place that's at least above ground compared to your old place." he continued talking, and I followed silently behind him, listening to his fair words and wondering when this dream would show its true colors.

I remembered being placed in a cell with a few others and then handed wood which I greedily ate with very little grace. At least it was prepared upon arrival rather than still breathing this time. I remembered the others shunning me. I was the monster. The murderer. The one that no one was to approach. So no one did.

I was set to work after a while, work like earlier but with much better working conditions. No whips, no hounds and no slavers. We had to work, but it was better than before. We also got fed more and received warmer clothing. I got a shirt so I could hide my cursed scars. Even if everyone knew them to be there, it felt good to know that they couldn't see them with the shirt there.

Then, one day, it happened. It had been kind of cold lately as winter approached, and some had been complaining about not being able to sleep since it was so cold. Jellal promised us blankets, but the delivery was delayed. That was when there was one who dared move to my corner. A girl around my age, with black hair and really nice eyes. She said nothing, just sat down next to me and fell asleep. Everyone were rendered speechless, as was I. I had no problem with the cold since my body temperature generally was higher. Everyone sort of just knew that, though no one had dared utilizing this until now.

Hope. Her name was Hope. And she would be the one to bring exactly that back into my life.


	20. Hope

I am falling. Or flying..? From my position it would almost seem that way, but since it was water that awaited me up there and since there was this thing called gravity.. I was probably falling. Head first. It was hard to think. Hard to do anything but fall. I still saw the tower that swiftly passed beside me. I still saw Natsu that failed to notice me falling past him as he ascended the stairs on the way up. He also failed to see Loke that also was falling.

Where did he come from? And when? I had not even felt the drain of summoning, nor was I certain on whether it should even be possible. Jellal Fernandez had drained me completely after all, drained of magic, right before I managed to somehow break a hole in the wall and jump. Without my keys. Keys I barely could see twinkling in the hand of my newest Spirit. Good. That was.. good. My head met water, the fall making me plunge into the depths without me having much strength to do anything about it. I dragged in my first breath of the salty wet, felt my systems complain about the general lack of air, but did nothing about it. Perhaps would it be better if I just gave up.

I remembered the first time Hope led me up to that room so Jellal could drain me completely. It was for the best, an attempt to fill up the reserves it needed to fulfill whatever purpose it had. The draining of magic was agonizingly painful, and left me hurting for days after. Hope said it was for the greater good, and always supported me on the way back to our cell where she would feed me since I would be unable to.

Someone dragged hold of me around my second intake of seawater, started to drag me upwards, or at least I assumed it to be upwards.

I remembered how Hope would talk to me and tell jokes and always remained around. She always knew when I had recovered enough to be brought up to the room again. She was smart like that. And she would apologize for the others that still remained strangely distant even after realizing that I didn't want to hurt them.

The sea started to surge, and then started to become really blurry as I was brought to the surface, and there was a boat. A wooden boat, kind of old and leaky but good enough for me to be brought into, Loke forcing me to puke up the water and then to breathe. He was stubborn, and thwarted my half assed attempt of killing myself.

I remembered the chaos. The yelling and the shrieking. I remembered Hope telling me that they didn't need me anymore, and since I wasn't needed I was too dangerous to keep around. I remembered the knife she had in her hand, bloody already from her initial attack. Hope was good with weapons. Unlike many others she knew how to handle them in combat. She knew how to dodge and use the movement of her opponent to her advantage.

And since she was a friend, I could hardly do much else than try dodging, something I was not very good at. She was crying. I remembered how she was crying. She was a friend, and she was trying to end me for the benefit of the others, even if she did not want to.

The ground swayed from waves, I could see Loke sitting beside me and looking outwards, looking for possible followers. By the looks of things there were none. Then again, Natsu had been heading up there not too long ago. Jellal should be pretty preoccupied with him around.

I remembered when I finally lost it. It had taken longer this time since I had fought so hard against it in fear for those others that remained in the room. Those that had started supporting her.

Then there was more shrieking, and distant explosion sounding booms. Someone else was out there, fighting and by the sounds of things creating quite an amount of havoc on their way to this place.

There was an increase in swaying, and then there was a giant wave that swooped the boat up from the waters and brought us far away as a light lit up the skies. I closed my eyes.

I remembered how Mama finally got to me and took me away. Away and home. Back to the village in the North. She had been the distant fighter, and had finally pinned down my location to this little island. This little tower. And like always upon determining my whereabouts she had come to fetch me and bring me home.

I remembered how one day Hope was standing outside the house outside my village. Lost and looking for a place to stay. Mama was on an errand. In the village. Something about escorting some wares to a nearby village that wasn't all that nearby since few things were in this part of the land.

"Lucy." Loke said. I opened my eyes. How long had I..? The starlit sky marveled above me.

"Hm?" I grunted in my hoarse voice, hoarse because surging seawater wasn't all that good for my sore throat.

"Who is Hope?" he asked.

"A girl I killed" I stated in a dead voice.

"What?" his eyes were wide as he entered my vision. Loke the Lion spirit, the one that blamed himself for the death of his former Master. I moved my eyes so I looked him straight in the eyes.

"She was my best friend. And I killed her." I said. She was also a friend of Millianna back then. She was the one to introduce us, and I had been so thrilled to meet another that adored cats. Millianna had been reserved, of course, but she let me be there. They didn't call me names either, not good nor bad ones. I was just Lucy White.

"How?" he asked.

"Suffocation. I suffocated her in a bathtub." I elaborated. She had begged me to. She had begged me to kill her in the unbearable heat from the poisonous flames I did not know the origin to. And I had obliged in the end because I saw no other way. Her eyes had even thanked me. Thanked me for taking the misery away. That was the day the house burned down. The house I used to live in. The house I called my home. It would never be rebuilt again. And I would forever remember how it felt to wrap my hands around her neck and squeeze.

"You are free to leave if you want, Loke the trickster." I stated after a few moments of silence.

"Why did you kill her?" he asked.

"Does it matter?" I asked back.

"Yes." he replied.

"We were trapped. The house was burning, and the flames were hurtful to eat. Like poison. The air was thick with smoke, and the house would collapse in not too long. She would die no matter what, really. I knew it and she knew it. And she wanted it to end. She asked me. Then she begged me. Then I gave in." I said in my dead voice.

"Never again. I would rather die than let anyone else die like that again. That is what I swore. But look at me. It is too late to swear anything. Death is natural. Everything dies." I sat up.

"She isn't the only one that I have killed, but she was the last. She will be the last. You know how it feels to feel responsible for something like that better than many, Loke the trickster. Even if I was not entirely to blame I should have been stronger and I should have tried harder. And even if the circumstances would have ended in her death no matter what, direct murder is murder." I said. Then I laughed, somewhat strained.

"I gave her a grave, you know. A really pretty grave. But I never buried her. Her body remained in the scorched remains of the house. When I tried looking for her once she was already buried by some other person. An unmarked grave by the house." I continued. I had never told anyone. I was not to be entirely blamed. I knew that. But I was responsible. Responsibility was a terrible thing. One I was not too fond of.

We remained silent for a while after that, let the current take hold of us.

"She was your best friend?" he asked.

"My only friend too, if that matters. Though.." I trailed off.

"Though what?" he questioned.

"She tried killing me a few times." I mused to myself.

"I'm not sure if it is just Fairy Tail that is different, but in retrospect I get the feeling that friends aren't supposed to do that. Friends fight, but.." but friends do not try and kill each other. Back then it had seemed natural enough. Most people raised their weapons on me eventually, and it was better with that acknowledgement rather than the cold stare of those that walked by while attempting to ignore me. Loke sighed.

"You sure are strange." he said, and I laughed a more natural laughter.

"Maybe I am. But calling me strange is fine. People call Fairy Tail strange sometimes, and Fairy Tail is a good place." I replied.

"Are you going back there?" Loke asked.

"I don't think so. I want to remember them as the ones that smile rather than glare, you know." I replied.

"Why would they glare?"

"I'm a killer. A murderer. A monster. Fairy Tail is a strange place, Loke, and many people belong there, but a murderer they don't need. 'Sides, Mama ought to return from her hunting trip soon enough." I masked the hurt in my face as I mentioned that last one, and then looked at the keys he had given me back.

"This time I might be old enough to go with her, too." I said, managed to get up, and then, without warning, I used all my strength to toss the keys away, towards the quite distant and now strangely illuminated tower that had changed dramatically since I tossed myself off the top.

"What are you.."

"Forced closure." I said softly, and with wide eyes he disappeared, that spirit of mine. He deserved a better Master. With a sigh I plunged for the darkness once more, waiting for fate to take hold of me.

They stood by the shore, those Fairy Tail members. Gray Fullbuster, Erza Scarlet, Juvia Lockser and Natsu Dragneel. Oh, and Happy of course. They stood by the shore after barely managing to escape from the explosion that ended the Tower of Heaven. It had been a close call. A person named Simon even died.

Lucy had been nowhere to be found, however. The bastard with the blue hair had told them that the girl had already left, which was probably for the best when considering what happened next and all. Happy had her keys too. A set of keys he claimed to have fallen from the skies. Odd, but not impossible. Her keys.

A WHILE LATER

"Chief. What was their name again?" a voice sounded.

"Not sure, it was something fancy sounding." another replied.

"Hm. Like a story. I remember it sounded like a story." the first replied.

"A fairytale." the voice of a child chimed in.

"Ah, that's it. Fairy Tail." the first voice said.

"You should contact them, Chief." the second voice suggested.

"I will, since SHE seems to be out hunting still." the first voice said.

"Bring the girl to the village doctor so we can fix her.. where is she?" he continued when he notice that the girl in question no longer lay on the beach, lightly caressed by the waves that had brought her there.

"She's gone!"

"Where did she go!?"

"The temple?"

"Anyways, I will contact her guild."

"She DID seem happy with them around. Poor little lost girl."

And with that, the group of lesser demons left the shore, heading back to their homes, when suddenly.

"Ah, I've ended up here again, have I?" a voice said, and the lesser demons turned to see another arrival in a tiny rowboat.

"Ah. Clive. It's been a while." the Chief said, and the stranger saw them, thus smiling broadly.

"Long time no see indeed." the stranger laughed.

"You looking for the girl?" the first voice asked.

"What girl?"

"The little lost girl. Lucy, of course." he explained.

"Lucy? So she's alive?"

"Yes, she was here a moment ago." he said.

"So.. where is she?"

"Probably at the temple."

"Ah, the temple eh?" the arriving person said, and started heading for the temple straight away. So Lucy had gotten lost again. She sure got into a lot of trouble these days.

The Chief looked after the person.

"We should throw a feast." one suggested.

"No. Clive isn't one to linger for very long." the chief said.

"That is true. back to fishing then?"

"Okay."

And they went back to fishing.


	21. Clive

The sun shone far above as the temple of old times rose from the ground, ancient and unattended to. Plantlife had long since taken over and penetrated some of the walls, making the whole building seem like it had grown there rather than being built by some ancient tribe that no longer lingered about. He wondered where the old tribe had went, the one that approached the place, looking for the one the Chief of the nearby Demon Tribe had claimed to be here.

Inside she sat, huddled in a corner and sleeping soundly, the girl that was known for her ability to find a contemporary home in most places, including this one. Only wearing a pair of ripped shorts and a black t-shirt that wasn't really a t-shirt any longer in its shredded form. She had also clearly been involved in another bout of trouble by the looks of her battered self. That Lucy, always getting herself mixed into another battle of sorts. Layla never taught her self defence after all in hopes of this leading to less fighting. Strange logic, but then again, her Mama had her points every now and then.

"Oi, wake op, shorty." he squatted in front of her, flicked her forehead tryingly, which made her open her eyes instantly. He smiled then, a broad smile that had a sort of ominous tint to it.

"Who am I going to kill this time eh, for making you show those scars?" he asked, then effortlessly lost the black shirt with a skull he was wearing and tossed it to her.

"What are you doing here?" I asked. It had been a long time since I saw him. The shirt just lay in a bundle on my head since I still felt too weak to do anything about it.

"Are you really asking me that? A sense of direction is something that person failed to bring onto any of us." he laughed, and then started rummaging through that bag of his. He was always lost, that one, always wandering about without much reason, only to return briefly for a while when he was tired of all those that surrounded him.

"Hm. I think I have enough to patch you up. This'll sting, but I guess you already know that..." he continued, and brought up his gear of creams and bandages, started working with practiced hands.

"I'll ask you again, since you didn't answer me last time. Who did this to you?" he asked, the fellow sitting beside me just outside the temple of Galuna, the both of us enjoying the nice and warm rays of the sun while it remained in an angle where it could reach us. I was wearing his shirt, and feeling a little better, though I was uncertain as to where I should go next. Was this how he felt? Mayhap.

"I don't remember his name." I replied. Not that it was that important. It changed little. Just another beating.

"Your skill of remembering names is as it always have been, then. By the way, what's up with uncle's mark?" he continued.

"He has a mark? Have you seen him recently?" I asked, looked at him strangely. It had been a while since I had seen uncle too. It had been a while since a lot of things.

"No, he's as much of a drifter as I am, stupid. I'm talking about the one you have on your hand." he pointed at my right hand, where it still remained, that mark. Fairy Tail.

"This one? Does Uncle have a mark like this one?" I asked. Really?

"Seriously? You joined a guild without even knowing that? Sounds like you. I take it you haven't seen him in a while either then. Hm. I wondered where you went after I found the village." he said further, the boy, dragged a hand through his short hair.

"You saw that?" I asked, looked up in the skies.

"The graves? Mhm. It's what convinced me that you were on the road somewhere. To be honest I thought I gave you one the last time I went there. A grave, I mean. One body of a child in the ruins of her home. Thought it strange that fire was what got to you in the end, but it smelled rather odd, so I just assumed. Probably for the best that I didn't mark it." he said. He was awfully calm about such things. I sent him a look as he too seemed to be enjoying the sun, closing his eyes as he were. Blonde, pale and muscular since I knew him to be one to exercise a lot. Incredible strength, and one to pick fights rather than being sought for them. It had been too long since I last saw him.

That brother of mine.

"So you were the one that buried Hope. I always wondered who did that." I mused.

"Hope, eh? Strange name. You the one that gave it to her?" my brother asked. He was one to always look after me when he was around. Beat up the village children. Chase the wyverns. When he was around. Admittedly that was not very often. He went on adventures. Long ones. Dangerous ones. I remembered him coming home once, crawling and bloody and nearly dead. Mama had been mad then, called him reckless and left the house. I had to drag him in and fix him up myself.

"No. 'Course not." I said, felt a little offended.

"Okay. Just thought.. since you were the one that convinced everyone to name Faith. Similar names, you know." he just mused. We fell into silence for a while, enjoying the sounds of nature that surrounded us.

"So, you seen her around lately?" he asked after a while. I knew he would ask. He didn't really like talking about her. They always argued, and I think she was the reason he never stuck around for long. Mama.

"She's out hunting." I said, didn't look at him, kept my gaze locked forward.

"Really? For how long this time?" he asked, seemed annoyed and perhaps a bit surprised.

"A while." I replied. She would return. She always did. What the fellow at the tower had said was a lie. She hadn't abandoned me. She wouldn't do that. Mama wasn't that kind of person. Then again.. neither was Igneel, according to her. And he.. he left too.

"How long, blondie? How long has she been gone, exactly, 'cause I have a feeling I already know the answer." he continued. I kept my gaze forward. Then I felt his hand on my chin and was forced to look into the dark eyes of the person that would be furious with her for doing what she had done. He stared straight into my eyes with a furrow on hiss brow, and I could practically see his emerging rage.

"That woman. She dared leaving you behind like that?" he said in a dangerously low voice.

"She didn't abandon me, she's just out hunting." I defended her, and his eyes narrowed.

"Really now." he said, did not sound convinced at all, but allegedly decided to let it rest. He sighed, and then let go of my chin.

"So, you joined a guild. They nice to you, 'cause I'm telling you, if they're not.." he let that one hang there.

"They're really nice. Really REALLY nice!" I said, lifted my hands in the air to emphasise my point, which made me grimace since my body wasn't exactly in any shape to move much.

"What d'you say to make that old oarsman rowing us ashore, eh? I got a real good bounty for my last job, so I reckon we should celebrate before I go on the next one. You haven't seen some fellows with sledge hammers by any chance, have you?" he said, got up on his feet and hoisted me up on his back. Sledge hammers. Sledge. Hammers. That DID ring a bell. AH! The ones I met in the village.

"I met some in Magnolia a while back. Northerners, right?" I said, refrained from mentioning what they did in Magnolia at the time.

"Perfect. Now I just need to know how to get to Magnolia from here..." he said, heading for the shore where the old man usually would be sitting. Or the old demon. He usually sported the human form since he rowed to and from the human ports on the mainland. That was what he had told me, at least. He was the one to row Natsu, Gray and I here too, back when we were supposed to break a curse that wasn't really a curse at all.

"OI! Old man, row us ashore, will ya!" he yelled, that brother of mine as we neared the dock, and I could hear the fellow agree. So I would head to the world of humans again. Did I want to go there? I wasn't sure. He put me down carefully on the ride, grinned widely at me.

"So, the guild any fun?" he asked. He was not one to get along with a lot of people. His standards were high, and his mouth crude.

"It was, yes. I think I'll quit, though." I said, looked out at sea, my look sort of neutral. The moment we started moving he was down for the count though. That terrible motion sickness that had haunted him always. I wondered briefly where his companions were, if they remained companions still. They might be dead, as all things eventually dies. The movements of the boat cut any possible continuation off until we reached the shore. The old man remained silent. Didn't interfere in the conversation. The only thing that told of his presence would be the repetitive sound of the oars hitting the water, and the creaking of wood as he moved us towards our destination. Hargeon, wasn't it?

"Why?" he asked after laying in a helpless heap on the ground recuperating when he eventually had managed to crawl onto solid ground. A continuation to my statement earlier. He didn't ask why I quit the guild as if it was a bad thing. Curiosity. He just genuinely wanted to know why.

"I don't think they need my kind there, is all. They don't know who I was, and that is fine and all, but not knowing doesn't erase it, you know." I said. The boy got up, once more hoisted me up on his back with my arms loosely draped around his neck, and we started heading for wherever we could get a decent amount of food.

"You mean a monster?" he asked. I didn't answer. Didn't have to. He was one that just tended to know those things. He knew, mainly due to the same accusations hanging over him. That, and he had been very persuasive when asking the village kids about me.

He had always been very good at persuasion. It was what earned him the name I had given him. Mama doesn't give names, mainly because she thinks that will make it easier for us to die. Without dying we cannot have a name on our grave, and without a grave we cannot die. That is her logic. I had named Faith. Then she died. Perhaps was Mama right.

"Where's that friend of yours, by the way. That odd fellow?" I asked.

"Oh, he's somewhere. I lost him due to some huge wave. We were pretty much down for the count due to the.. ugh.. you know, but he can swim." my brother replied. So his friend was out on a swimming trip, huh.

"What about..?" I started asking. The cat. Where was the cat? Had he ended like Odin, on the battlefield?

"Ah, her's fine, he's out searching. They were supposed to sit this one out anyways. Say, you want to join me in catching these guys later on? I'll let you in on the reward." he said, and then entered what seemed to be some better than average inn.

"I want one of those booths down there for me and her alone." he stated, produced a stack of money from the pockets of his loose, white trousers.

"Ah, of course.. Mr..?" the man said, and he grinned wider, that brother of mine as he sent me a look, remembering the day when I gave him his name.

"Sting. You can call me Sting." he said.


	22. Brother

"Sting!" he yelled, the fellow with the red eyes and the black hair, soaking wet from his apparent swim in the ocean. He didn't yell very loud or anything, but the aura he was emanating made plenty up for it.

"Ah, Rogue, there you are! Come'ere, I've already ordered!" Sting yelled back, and waved from our booth. I had never actually met that companion of his, but I had heard of him. Rogue. So that was his name. The cats were nowhere to be seen, though. Where were the cats?

"Thought you drowned." my brother laughed and slung an arm around my shoulders, grinning widely. I winced slightly by the sudden gesture since my body still was sore, but let it be. My brother was a tad overprotective. And he had certain issues regarding ownership. All that he considered his he would valiantly declare to be his, and he would just as valiantly protect it, whether or not protection was needed.

"I won't die so easily." Rogue commented as he sat down opposite to us, unsmiling and seemingly in no way happy to see any of us. He sent me a look, then turned to his blonde companion.

"Who is that?" he asked. I looked at him. Though he seemed more contained than that other person he really.. he really did look like him, didn't he...

"You look like that guy, you know. Hm. Who was he? I think he shattered half my ribcage, but I don't remember what he's named. Actually I don't think he ever told me. Wasn't you though..." I cocked my head to the side, furrowing my brows. That guy on the moving castle. He had black hair and red eyes too, but his name.. Galion? Gofield? I knew someone mentioned it. Ah. Gajeel. His name was Gajeel. I had a feeling I might see him again. His companion or at least guild mate Juvia had been lurking around lately after all. It might've been a coincidence but I had seen her both at the guild and at that resort.

"You sure don't look like that.." Sting commented, probably referring to my current state. As if to emphasise his point he moved to lift my shirt.

"Sting. That is no way to treat a girl." Rogue commented before he got to it, and his eyes moved to look at the guy.

"Not like I'm some pervert, I just wanted to check how bad it is." he commented, but stopped his hand temporarily.

"Wasn't this time. It was when.." I stopped talking. It might be best if he didn't know. I almost died that day, and besides, the ones responsible for much of the damage before that would be the ones he was out searching for at the moment. Everything dies, and everything has an end. Rushing the end of others was not something I was prone to do, however.

"I'm Lucy, by the way. I'm his sister." I introduced myself, looking at the boy that did not seem like the smiling type. My brother was more of a smiler in the family.

"Well, we're not actually siblings." Sting clarified, temporarily distracted. Well. There were different stories around that. Mama would say that Sting was hers. Sting would deny it fiercely. Both were known to serve the occasional excellent lie, so I had decided that he was my brother, regardless of the truth. Mama had not really raised him, though. A dragon had. I failed to remember his name at the moment, but I knew that a dragon had raised the boy. That was the main reason why he wasn't around much.

"Okay." Rogue replied, his voice suggesting that he held no interest regarding the matter. He was looking at me though, aware of the attempt to divert the conversation, and I saw a spark of curiosity regarding why though he did not ask. At least not right away.

"But someone needed to protect Lucy from that crazy wench that calls herself a mother." Sting went on, and now I reacted.

"Mama is an excellent mother, thank you very much!" I said, rammed and elbow into his side. Somehow I had a feeling it hurt as much for me as it did for him, and I grimaced as he groaned. My elbow wasn't broken, but all my muscles were in no immediate hurry to be used.

"Why is she wearing your shirt?" Rogue continued asking. He seemed disinterested, but he had to harbour some interest in order to ask in the first place. He still seemed to wonder why I had changed the subject from some battle that had occurred prior to my last one.

"Someone beat her up before I found here on Galuna. You sure you don't remember his name?" Sting said, and I blinked. Ah, I guess Sting WAS shirtless. I hadn't really thought about that until now. I looked sideways at him.

"Quite. I think he's already beaten though, 'cause the island he was on exploded, I think." I replied. Didn't know when that was either, since I didn't know how long I had been sleeping for, or for how long I had been at sea before I landed on Galuna for that matter. Natsu had been heading for the guy too. Another reason why I thought him to be beaten. Natsu Dragneel was strong. The food started arriving, and I thoughtfully took a piece of bread, chewing on it. I was kind of hungry. Sting sighed.

"Where's Lector and Frosch, by the way?" he asked. I had been wondering about that too.

"Back at the hotel. You found the gang yet?" Rogue said, and asked about a gang. Probably the ones with the sledgehammers. And apparently Rogue had found the time to check the cats into a hotel, yet found himself out of need to change from his still dripping wet attire. He was kind of strange, but I figured I hardly was one to talk.

"Lucy's seen them in a place named Magnolia." Sting said between mouthfuls.

"That's where Fairy Tail is, isn't it?" Rogue said. Ah. Fairy Tail might be kid of sort of famous. I had figured that out after not too long, though I wasn't sure why. Something about destroying a lot, perhaps? Or something else?

"Mhm. She's a member." Sting confirmed. He failed to mention that I was considering leaving. Because I was a monster, and because that place was not in need of such a thing.

"Really?" Rogue sent me another look. Was it interest or surprise I saw in his eyes?

"What kind of magic does she use?" he then asked, turning back to Sting again.

"Depends." I answered before Sting got to it. Then I remembered. My hand had automatically gone for my keys, but they were nowhere to be found. I tossed them away. A ritual of goodbye, mayhap. Loke was a member of Fairy Tail too, after all. He might've attempted to make me return before he learned the truth.

"I guess I use Dragon Magic," I muttered, and Rogue, that had taken the time to take another bite of his meal, almost choked on his mouthful of food. He managed to swallow, and stared at me.

"I thought you were a Celestial Mage. Last time I saw you you were a Celestial mage!" Sting commented, less surprised than the other. I had always been durable, and I had a lot of magic stored within, but even though there had been the incidents and though I knew of Igneel, I did not know what his parentage had to do with me until later. And Mama had told me not to to speak of him.

"You're a Dragon Slayer? Since when?" he asked on, and I sent him a glare.

"I'm not a dragon slayer. I use Dragon magic. I don't slay dragons, so obviously I can't be a slayer." I said, and kept munching on my bread, grabbed for a few more items to fill my plate before it was all gone. These people had more courtesy while eating than Natsu, but they ate exceedingly and very fast still.

"Did you have a lacrima inserted?" asked Rogue, apparently either accepted my correction or decided that he didn't really care either way. I looked at him. Imagined a lacrima being inserted.

"Wouldn't that be very painful? They're awfully large to be inserted in any way," I muttered, cocked my head to the side, which made Sting almost choke on his food.

"With magic, Lucy. Magic!" he specified, bringing my imagination back from some pretty bloody visuals.

"Ah. No. I don't have any lacrimas inside me. At least not as far as I know." I replied then.

"So you've been taught by a dragon?" Rogue asked.

"No. I was taught by Mama." I said. Why would a dragon teach me? That would be strange, especially with Mama around. Mama was not fond of the thought of a dragon around me. I didn't know why, but accepted it.

"That woman..." Sting almost hissed, seeming annoyed. Then he went back to his food.

"What element do you use?" Rogue asked then. Sting would already know that one.

"Fire." I replied none the less. Sting did not know about Igneel. But he knew about Mama and her abilities.

"By the way, Sting. Word at the docks says the gang has travelled towards the Northern Borders of Fiore. It would seem that they are heading home." Rogue said.

"They did? We should head over there right away then! I really want that bounty. 'Sides, they payed a little visit to this little Blondie, and I have a feeling it wasn't a friendly one." he said, that brother of mine. So he had caught up on that even with my diverting skills.

"They weren't all that strong. Normal humans aren't usually that strong." I commented matter-of-factly. My eyes grew kind of distant as I said it, reminiscing the way of humanity. I was human, yet I was not considered human by all. It was a strange human trait that, excluding those that differed from their very race.

"So what did they do, eh?" Sting asked. I looked at him but remained silent. His eyes narrowed.

"Why are you after them?" I asked. I knew my brother was one to remain determent when he decided to hunt someone down, but usually there would be some reason behind it. I wondered what the Northerners had done to earn being hunted down by him.

"I caught their boss, and I want to finish the job." he said. Ah. Completion. Made sense.

"Now, what did they do?" he asked again. I couldn't divert his attention now.

"They sang the song of monsters. Then they tried to kill me. Obviously they failed." I said. Nothing unusual there, but I saw it flash over his face. They had more punishment in store for them now. Then he smiled, hiding that one dangerous attribute of his away. I'd really done it now, hadn't I...

"What do you say, shorty, you want to tag along? You said you wanted to leave that other place, so why not tag along with us for a while, eh?" Sting smiled broadly.

"Like right now?" I asked. Sting had carried me here. Did he expect me to tag along on such a trip now? I might be able to do it. If I exerted myself. He looked me over and seemed to realise the same thing.

"Ah. That's right. Well, you can stay here with Rogue for now, and we'll talk about it when I get back. Shouldn't take too long." Sting said. I nodded then. This Rogue seemed like a mellow person, but if Sting trusted him enough to stick around him for as long as he had I deemed him trustworthy too. And with that the food on the table was gone, Sting got up and left.

That was sudden...

We both looked after him, and then the red eyes of Rogue was back on me as he seemed to look me over.

"Can you walk?" he asked, and I smiled apologisingly.

"Probably not." I admitted. Without another word Rogue put a small stack of money to pay for the food, seeing how Sting while showing them the money earlier had payed for nothing. Then he got up and managed to hoist me up on his back, and he started walking.

"What does he mean when he says you're not really siblings?" Rogue as he walked into our alleged room where there were two single beds, and one comfy chair where both Frosch and Lector lay sleeping. He dumped me into one of the beds, and I instantly crept under the duna, enjoying the soft bed. It wasn't often I slept in beds.

"He's not too happy with Mama, is all. Because she abandoned him and all." I replied, looking at Rogue until he without any further ado started stripping off his still wet clothing. I turned away since I sort of felt that watching people change wasn't what one ought to do.

"Abandoned him?" Rogue asked, still shuffling about and by the sounds of it still changing.

"Mhm. Sting is the oldest of us. Mama was very young when she got him, so she left him. He might've died if his dragon hadn't found him. At least that's what she says. He came looking for her one day, and then he found me too. He wasn't around much since he had to sneak away from his dragon in order to come." I said. I remembered the brief visits. Mama wasn't always around. Sometimes she would be out hunting. Sting asked what she did on her hunting trips too, but I didn't tell him, since she didn't always tell me either. She always returned, and that was what was important, rather than the being away part.

"He never told me that." Rogue commented, and I turned to look at him since the shuffling had stopped. He only wore his boxers, but they were dry so he was not likely to suddenly discard them.

"Then perhaps shouldn't I have told you. But you're friends, aren't you? He might've not told you because he thinks Mama is lying, and because he thought I died. Of course I didn't die, but many people don't talk about the dead." I mused. Then I closed my eyes, fell promptly asleep. Not until one last thought struck me, though. He had told me he wanted to marry me once. There was that too...

He looked at her, the sleeping girl that claimed to be related to the one and only partner of his, if he excluded the cats. Sting had never told him he had family, but then again it could be as the girl said. Sting might see her as some sort of family, only not the literal kind. And he had thought her to be dead. Rogue briefly wondered what would have led to such a belief, but the girl was far off into dreamland already, at the moment incapable of answering any questions. And she had been beaten up badly by those Sting was in the process of hunting down. Rogue had seen the eyes of his partner when she told him. The eyes that flashed with the determination to beat the ones responsible. Such recklessness when the ones he cared about got caught in the crossfire.

But why did the song seem to matter? Rogue was not very acquainted with the customs of the North. He might've been there with his dragon, but without any human intervention other than Sting there wasn't much he had learned. He had known of the fact that Sting allegedly was from outside Fiore, though. THAT he had known. Little else.


	23. The Last

He sat before her, across a ridiculously fragile looking kitchen table that somehow seemed to have endured the strength of Maya Clive for quite some time when looking at the obvious signs of use. That, or she had stolen it somewhere. Gildarts would not put it past her.

"What do you want, Gilly?" she asked as her hands moved the knife with practiced ease, cutting up ingredients for her ever famous stew, one of the few things that woman could make without making a mess and a possible lethal meal. Gilly was a nickname she had given that little brother of hers when he was just a child, and she always teased that she would stop calling him that when he grew some balls. Evidently, past thirty, he still hadn't earned enough respect to be considered a man.

There was something different about her, though. Something that led the man sitting by the table he feared he would break in no time at all to believe that something was up. Granted, he had not seen much of her for years, not much at all since she finally managed to kick him out of their home and into the vast world. Maya had practically raised him after the accident that claimed the lives of their parents, an accident he was too young to remember but that she obviously did. The bliss of family life had lasted until he was fed up with her constant remarks regarding why he didn't get his own place already. He would've been around fourteen at the time, and he had joined Fairy Tail not too long after.

But she was a bit tense, the woman. Sort of preoccupied. He turned abruptly at the sound of footsteps, half expecting the much missed presence of Odin, the cat she always kept around. But what met him was not a cat.

"Mama, I'm going to the graveyard, 'kay?" the small voice of possibly the cutest girl alive said, wearing nought but big white t-shirt that was held in place by a belt around her stomach and thus worked as a sort of dress that reached below her knees. A pair of big, brown eyes looked at the back of Maya for then to move to the man that sat wide eyed and stared at his apparent niece.

"Hey there, honey, what's your name?" he said, and she stood there, her arms down and her bare feet curling their toes.

"She doesn't have one." Maya sounded with her back still turned.

"Does too. The weird lady gave me a name." the girl argued.

"Well she's not your Mama, so.." Maya did not get to finish the sentence.

"Lucy. What's yours?" the girl said, ignored the heeding from her mother. He smiled then, Gildarts, smiled at the way she seemed to cock her head to the side, sort of curious for his answer.

"Call me Uncle." he said, and she stared at him for a moment.

"That's an odd name. But I'm going to the graveyard, 'kay? I'll be back soon." the little girl that had presented herself as Lucy said, and went for the door, opening it wide to reveal the darkness that awaited outside. It was late, really. Late, and wintering, so the sun set earlier.

"Isn't it a bit late for you to go out, Lucy? Won't you be afraid of the dark?" he asked after her, and she turned her head in the doorway, her big eyes serious.

"Monsters aren't afraid of the dark." she said simply without any indication of humour in her voice, and then she was gone, gone into the woods alone, that little girl.

"Aren't you going to stop her." Gildarts asked as the door closed behind the little one.

"I'll give her an hour before I go out. That way she won't get too lost." Maya replied.

"She's younger than I'd imagined her." the man said. The man calling himself Uncle. Strange name. It might mean something special, I just didn't know what. There was the sound that probably meant Mama chugged something at him. Something that hit him but didn't kill since he made a sound and didn't fall. I stood outside. Didn't mean to listen in really. I just needed to decide on what direction to pick today. One hour. She would give me one hour.

"She's not the first, DIMWIT. She's the last." the first part was said with annoyance, the last with that thing called sadness. Mama had not looked at me since the incident. The incident that ended in the end of that boy. She didn't think I knew what I had done. She thought I didn't know because I was so out of it when she found me. Mama had not looked at me since. Not once. I felt tears prickle their way as they did when she didn't look, and sometimes when she did look too.

I needed to find him. I needed to give him a grave.

I opened my eyes with a start. I lay in a bed, and suddenly remembered my meeting with Sting. Ah. It had been a while since I had those old dreams. Dreams from back then, back when I used to cry a lot. Mama never yelled at me for doing what I did, but back then...

Back when I was a child, that was the first time her hunting trip lasted for a really long time. And I knew, deep within, that I was to be blamed for that.

I sat up slowly, assessed my current condition and then my legs felt soft carpet under them as I slid them off the bed and onto the floor. Getting up turned out to be harder than anticipated, and I felt my knees buckle under me as I crashed with the ground.

No walking, then.

I started crawling on my legs towards that door I spotted, open and inviting me into its current darkness. I do not fear darkness because monsters are not fear darkness. My song had told me that in one of its more obscure verses that I failed to remember properly. The Song of Monsters. The song they sung while carving my title into my back, and that eventually almost drove Mama away from me.

I made it to the bathroom, closed the door carefully behind me. I undressed and felt my way to something towel-ish-feeling, wetted it under the sink and started washing myself in the dark.

He had threatened to tell them. That person with the strange tattoo under his eye. The one that had drained me of magic and given me a beating. I wondered if Fairy Tail knew now. I wondered if they had gotten a tally of the people that had succumbed to my flames. I wondered if they hated me now.

"Lucy?" came the voice from outside the door. The voice belonging to the person named Rogue. The one that seemed ever serious.

"Hm?" I replied. I did not cry. Not this time. I cried when I saw Millianna again, but not this time. If I was to cry for all that ended there would be no end to my tears. Besides, Mama hates crying. It is a waste of time. I'd never really seen her cry. When she was sad she would leave for a while, or become really really angry.

"Are you okay in there?" he asked.

"'Course I am," I replied simply, drenched my towel in the water from the sink again.

"Smells like blood." came the comment from the other side of the door. I didn't reply, just got up, slowly and with a few failed attempts. I leaned against the sink, took a deep breath and managed to stand up properly. Of course, I could not meet the boy as I was, undressed and all, so I moved my hands over the cool tiled surface until I found the light switch. I turned it on, and could see the discarded clothing on the floor. My shorts and the t-shirt my brother had given me.

"Lucy?" Rogue asked again while I shuffled around with stiff limbs and struggled to get dressed.

"Who's Lucy?" asked another voice, a voice of one of the cats.

"Someone Sting knows." Rogue replied, and I finally opened the door.

"All done." I declared, gave him half a smile.

"How does he know her?" a red cat asked. The other one remained silent, just stared at me with big eyes. So they were all up. I also noticed the curtains that had covered the windows were now drawn to the side, letting in bright daylight from the outside.

"Sorry for waking you." I muttered silently, smiled sheepishly as I leaned against the doorframe.

"You didn't wake me. I just returned from an errand. Here. Some food." Rogue said, held up a bag that smelled like food towards me. I lifted my hand, and managed to muster up the strength to take it.

"Thank you!" I said and smiled brightly. Food. He had brought me food. He didn't say anything, just walked over to his bed and opened his own bag. So he had not eaten wherever he had gotten it. How strange.

"You must be his cat, right? Stings cat. Odin told me that the strong would get a cat, though he was really old and arrived before most of them." I said, looked at the red cat. Lector. Wasn't it? Or Frosch?

"That's right! Sting is the strongest mage in the whole wide world!" the red cat said proudly, and I giggled.

"He probably thinks so too. Might be, too, it's been a while since I saw him fight." I agreed. Then I held the bag of food tightly to my chest as I stumbled my way over to the bed.

"Why were you in the dark, in there?" Rogue asked emotionlessly from his spot on his bed, and I looked at how he nodded towards the bathroom.

"I don't mind the darkness, is all. And I kind of crept there, so finding the light switch seemed like a hassle." I replied, opened my bag and dragged out some sandwiches. It had been a while since I ate last. At least it felt like that.

"So you're not afraid of the dark?" he asked as I took my first bite. I made sure to chew properly and swallow before I gave my answer.

"Monsters aren't afraid of the dark." I replied, used the sentence I had used when I was so young. Uncle. At the time I had thought it to be a mere name, and I still regarded it sort of that way. What his real name was I didn't know. Apparently he was a Fairy Tail mage, though. At least according to Sting. I ate my first sandwich in silence, grabbed for the second one in the bag when I noticed that it was sort of silent. I raised my gaze and saw Rogue looking at me oddly, his eyes sort of wide. I cocked my head to the side as I wondered why he stared, then decided to leave it be as I continued eating.

People had stared before. It wasn't something new.

"Are there any graveyards about?" I asked after finishing my meal. Rogue had eventually discontinued his staring to finish his meal as well.

"Not that I know of. I think it is tradition to burn the dead in Hargeon." he replied. Ah. Burn them. Reducing them to nought but ash.

"Do we have anything specific to do?" I asked as I laid back down in the bed, staring at the ceiling and feeling content for the moment, mayhap except from the disappointment due to the lack of a graveyard to visit.

"Not really. There's a Festival coming up in Magnolia in a few days time that we might check out, but we'll have to wait for Sting to return first." Rogue replied. Ah. He had that bounty he wanted to collect.

"Will he be alright?" I asked.

"Sting is super strong, those punks won't get the best of him!" the red cat exclaimed in utter admiral.

"Fro thinks so too!" the other cat said, uttering his or her first words since I arrived. It was a cute voice. Fro. So the red cat would be Lector, then.

"Not talking about the fight. Sting has a terrible sense of direction, almost as bad as mine but not quite. Since none of you are around I suppose he could get very lost." I said matter-of-factly without looking away from the roof.

"He has gotten better at asking for directions." Rogue commented. The way he said it, if I ignored the lack of emotions that also worked to make it different, suggested that asking might not be the right word for it. Demanding might be more like it. Or forcing.

"I think I might sleep some more." I stated, closed my eyes but remained as I was on top of the duna. The others shuffled around some.

"What did you mean?" came the question after a while. I opened my eyes to look at Rogue. He stood beside my bed, a bag over his shoulder as he might want to go for another walk.

"About what? And you don't need to leave, I sleep pretty well no matter the noise." I replied. He smiled then, a half smile that made him seem at least a bit nicer.

"I already know that. You've been sleeping for nearly two days. I am preparing my gear is all. What did you mean when you said monsters don't fear the dark?" he said. Oh. So he wasn't leaving?

"Haven't you ever heard of any scary stories? The monsters always come from the dark. From the closet, from under the bed or from some dark cave. Monsters can't fear the dark because that is where they're from and where they have to be in the end." I said, and then looked at the roof again.

"So you are calling yourself a monster." Rogue commented. I smiled then.

"I am a monster. Even Mama called me a monster once, though she doesn't know that I heard that. I even have a song, though the song really is older than me," I said, and then closed my eyes. I could spare a few days while I awaited the return of my probably lost at the moment brother, and until he returned I had little to worry about. Ah, a festival in Magnolia, eh? Did I want to go there? I couldn't really deny that I kind of did, though the thought of meeting the others again was considerably scarier to think about. I'd cross that bridge when I got there. For now I needed to sleep in order to heal some.


	24. Maya Clive

He stared at the wooden frame that held a comfortable mattress in place. A white pillow lay there, on top of a blanket that was neatly folded, both placed in the middle of the bed. He stared, his red eyes ever so slightly scrunched together, a scrunch that only would be visible for those that were good at noticing such things.

"She is not there..." Rogue muttered to himself, a statement that merely informed all of the too obvious fact. Lucy was not in the bed she had been sleeping in for a good while now. Nor was she in the room. A furrow made its way to the forehead of the dragonslayer. If she was not there, then where would she be?

"Stay here in case she returns." he continued in his usual silent voice, an order directed at the felines that stood by. Then he turned on his heel and left the rented premises. There was no point in wondering where she was. Actions were far more potent than mere thoughts about possibilities and what-ifs. He would have ask around, and then start searching.

She could not be far, the girl that had named herself a monster.

I needed to see the sun, even if its rays were too sharp for the eyes of my darkened self. I needed to see that the world still remained, that it all had not been a dream. Such urges had started to emerge after my prolonged stay in the dark cave underneath the wrecked tower that thankfully was no more.

And it was still there, the sun. The sky was blue, and the air warm. People still smiled and laughed and talked of silly things. The world sure managed fine even after my prolonged absence, a fact I had known to be true for a long time. No graves would be found in the town called Hargeon according to the red eyed friend of my brother. Even if a graveyard was found, I was out of money since a while ago at the moment, out of money to buy candles for any awaiting graves.

My legs still worked though, and it felt good to put them to use, walking about and feeling life surging around me. I would not be a bother, so I hoped the people found it alright if I just walked among them, pretending to be normal.

They sure were busy today, moving with more haste than I remembered. Kept talking about this great festival in Magnolia. It hadn't happened yet.

"The sea..." I muttered to myself as the docks gave way to the sparkling blue, playing in the sunlight like only the sea could do. I let my legs move faster, until I was running in between people, my hair flowing behind me and my face split in a huge smile. For a moment I was a child, maybe four years of age, following the glinting yellow that was the hair of my mother.

Was there not someone there in front of me that looked awfully like her?

She was always there, a few steps ahead, making me run on stubby little feet, struggling to keep up with her speed.

I reached the end of the dock, just managed to stop without falling into the water. And I sat down, let the wind play with my hair while I stared at the never-ending blue that occupied both heaven and earth.

FLASHBACK

"You see that?" she asked, a lazy smile playing on her lip as she leaned her head almost upside down in order to look at me. We had walked a long while, made it all the way to this huge pond. It was so huge I couldn't even see the end of it.

"Mhm." I replied, stared at Mama with big eyes. She had taken me here for a reason, surely.

"That is the sea. Isn't it huge?" she asked on, and I nodded furiously. It was beyond huge. Was there any word that meant bigger than huge? If there was, then I did not know that word.

"It's the hugest in the whole world!" I agreed, spread my arms out to show her just how huge I meant, since I did not know that one stronger word for it. And she laughed. It was one of those barmy laughters, though I saw some of that sadness in her eyes that sometimes made Mama strange.

"Yes. Yes it is. But the world, you see. The world is much much huger. Like THIS!" she used the same motion with her arms, only her arms were a lot bigger than mine.

"Really?" I questioned, and she nodded.

"And what you should do in order to see it, do you know what that is? You should travel. Just walk and walk and walk until you're REALLY tired, and then walk some more. And you should have friends. Lots and lots of them. Enough to make a HUGE family." she said, her voice so exited in that very moment. It was as if Mama was speaking of her own dream, and she laughed loudly again, staring at the blue sky.

After a while her laugh died, and she sighed, though her smile lingered.

"But people like us can't do that. Not here, and not anywhere." she added. A little bark of laughter, sounding less merry, escaped her mouth.

"Remember that, my little angel. I am the same as you. And because we are cursed, you and I, we must stick together, right?" Mama said while raising a hand towards the sky. She looked at peace in that very moment. And then, suddenly, she turned around and grabbed hold of my waist, caught me in a crushing hug.

"I CAN'T HEAR YOU!" She yelled, and started tickling me. My screaming laughter resounded in the forest, as we were utterly alone.

I felt them run down, one by one, as I stared at the blue sky, pieces of water that I long since had declared futile. Even now I felt little sadness even with them there, obviously trying to tell me the state of my mind. Slowly the white flames that burnt so vividly within me would change colour to that dying hue of purple, numbing my mind so to forget what I was, and the fact that always swirled within me. I did not belong. I was cursed, and should not yearn for that which common people yearned for.

"There you are." came the dead voice of Rogue.

"We were looking everywhere for you!" Lector the cat said in his usual loud voice.

"Fro was worried." Frosch the cat chimed in.

"I apologise." I said calmly, dried my tears away and looked up with a smile.

"Just enjoying the view is all. The weather sure is nice today." I continued. Rogue sent me a long look before sitting down beside me, his legs dangling over the edge. Just like me he did not have long enough legs to actually reach the water, but he was almost there.

"Sting should be returning soon. If he returns today we might make it to the festival in Magnolia. I already found a nice inn where we could stay the night so that we can enjoy the whole event." he said.

"Aha." I shouldn't go there. I knew that I shouldn't go there. Too many temptations, and possibly even more awkward situations. Depending on how much they knew, I might even be chased out of town. But I had always been fond of festivals. They even had those beck in the village. I had never attended then, being too young or just not being welcomed altogether.

"He will be back today," I said, my voice filled with the confidence it always had on such matters. He would be back today. If not, then in the morrow. Mama would be back soon too, surely.

IN MAGNOLIA

"Seems like I missed quite the party." a man with redly brown hair smiled as he entered the premises of his ever rampant home, through a... hole in the wall. Incidentally it was also he that had made the hole, but it couldn't be helped. There had happened quite a few changes since Gildarts last set foot in Fairy Tail, after all. Amongst other things there had been a door where there now was a hole in the wall. The building itself also seemed to be, well, replaced altogether.

"Gildarts." Master greeted, surprised to see such an old friend coke by after such a long time, though not really. Gildarts never was one to ever arrive announced. Well, fair enough, the rearrangement of the town was a tip off, but other than that...

What met Gildarts in the halls was a bunch of badly beaten up Fairy Tail members, kudos to the just departed (not dead) grandson of the little man that at the moment was enjoying his beer.

"I know the training for the yearly Festival is harsh, but sheesh." the mage commented, and made his way to the bar.

"I got your call, old man, about wanting to talk. You didn't say about what though." he greeted Master, and sat down wearily on one of the sturdy barstools that had lived through a lot already, even being reasonably new as it was.

"I hope I didn't interrupt anything." Master replied calmly.

"Nope, I was already on my way back. I encountered a slight... setback... and the mission ended early." Gildarts replied.

"So what is this all about?" he asked further.

"Say, do you happen to have any family left alive?" Master asked, decided to get to it straight away. Gildarts just shrugged.

"Not as far as I know. Why?" was the reply.

"So you do not hold any relation with a woman named Maya Clive?" Master said, sought final confirmation. Gildarts almost choked on his spit, coughed for a bit before looking back at the little man. Few were heeding the conversation between the men, mayhap except from a redheaded individual eating a sandwich a few seats down the bar counter, and two friendly rivals that happened to be placed nearby in all their fully bandaged glory, dark blue and pink hair the only way of distinguishing them from each other at the moment.

"How did you come to know that... individual?" he asked, the word "individual" almost being spouted out, a hastily plead replacement for a less nice word meant to describe the person asked about.

"So you do know her?" Master asked.

"Know her? That... person..." he stopped, had to calm himself as he accidentally blew away part of the bar. He used the hand to drag down his face, sighing heavily.

"I suppose... that we ARE related... technically. Though I would never go as far as to call her family. She is... WAS... my sister." he eventually admitted. It seemed hard for the man to admit to such a relation at all.

"Aha. So.. ahem. So you know about your niece?"

"Lucy? Yes. I know about her. I brought flowers... Ah. She's here?!" he got up suddenly, looking about, most likely seeking a yellow sprout of hair to emerge from one of the unidentifiable bandaged bodies.

"I knew there was something odd about the whole village being.. that girl..." he muttered to himself.

"She's not here, Gildarts. Not at the moment at the least. She went missing during a mission a while ago." Master called, and Gildarts turned, a strange yet vibrant smile in place.

"So she was here? Really? Little Lucy was here?" he asked, his eyes sparkling.

"Ah. Yes. I was wondering about whether you know where she might be now." Master asked.

"She might be anywhere with her sense of direction. But she was here? Did she seem happy? Did she smile?" he kept asking.

"She even joined the guild." Master replied. And Gildarts laughed. He laughed and seemed so utterly... relieved?

"Ah... I was worried. I kind of hit her hard back then, you see. But she's well." he sighed, and dumped down on one of the benches.

"Hit her?" Erza Scarlet questioned, finally joining in on the conversation.

"Yes. She didn't tell you? Well, she is one to keep her secrets, and even if she wasn't she was pretty delirious at the time. There was this demon attacking her village, see? And it was a really tough nut to crack." the redheaded man said.

"It almost got her, and I had to push her aside. Was a bit rougher than intended. Then, as I was about to defeat it the thing sent me off with this sinister spell of sorts. Ugh... Took me a long time to get back." he explained. A. Demon? Wasn't that..?

"I hoped the issue was done with that, but though the demon I fought came with me to finish the fight, there was another one, and the village didn't stand a chance.

"I thought Lucy said her mother pushed her aside." Erza commented, sending Master a look. He nodded. He had heard a similar tale upon asking why Lucy was so severely injured upon arrival.

"Oi Gildarts. What kind of person is Maya?" asked Natsu Dragneel, finally entering as well.

"How much do you know?" Gildarts replied.

"She is strong, a bit strange, but ultimately a good person. Lucy kept talking about leaving with her mother whenever she would return from some hunting trip." Natsu said. He managed to sit up a bit further, though his aching muscles were begging him to give it a rest.

"So she's still talking about that, huh, after all this time." Gildarts mused, mostly to himself.

"What do you mean, Gildarts?" Erza asked. And another sigh resounded in the hall as a pair of wrinkles made their entry on the forehead of the physically strongest mage in Fairy Tail.

"Maya Clive locked her own daughter inside the house and set it alight with cursed flames. She was last seen walking through town at dusk, heavy black smoke emerging from direction where everyone knew her house to be. That was about seven years ago, on July Seventh, year 777." Gildarts said, his voice serious and filled with a kind of anger that apparently went back seven years, the day his sister tried to murder her own child before disappearing into smoke herself.

BACK IN HARGEON

I sneezed.

"Are you catching a cold?" Sting asked, sent me a partly worried look. We were walking beside the rail track on our way to Magnolia. It was still early enough to make it to the festival without taking the train and thus devastating the dragon slayers, so we had decided to walk.

"I don't think so." I muttered back, though I felt a chill moving up my spine as if someone was watching me intently, or mayhap talking about me? In any case, I got a better hold of my cloak, keeping the whisk of wind from making its way to my body. I knew that I shouldn't be going to that town ever again, but I owed it as much to them as I did to myself to offer a goodbye.


	25. The White Fox

How did it come to this? How?

My feet were dreary, yet moving with almost unimaginable speed none the less. They moved in that manner because I at the moment was unable to take on the foes chasing me. Yes. Chasing ME. Me ALONE.

Almost silent pads collided with soft ground again and again, together with the deep and throaty growls of my pursuers. They were many, and set on taking down me, the enemy.

AT THE GUILD

"The woman named Maya Clive. She was, what to call it... a special being. She was always a drifter, though there was one place she always seemed to return to, close to a cave she claimed held dear memories. Her house was near a village, so they got to know the kind kind of woman she was. To put it easy, she was not one it was easy to have around. She disliked people, could turn violent in a heartbeat if anyone said the wrong thing, and her STRENGTH." Gildarts stopped for a moment, reminiscing over her immense strength.

MEANWHILE

One of them flung themselves at me, ripping with sharp teeth and sharper claws, trying to make me fall so the rest could have a go. I managed to shake it off without it causing more than minor damage to my shoulder, without letting go of my running pace. They howled in frustration, and the pursuit continued.

AT THE GUILD

"Since she always talked about dragons, she was quickly nicknamed Dragonlady. She protected her village from harm despite her unfriendly nature, using her superior strength and blue flames. At some point, there was a child that was following this dangerous being whenever she walked through town on minor business. A little girl that had no name."

MEANWHILE

Rogue and Sting were nowhere to be seen. Why would they, after being challenged by a blonde boy that smelled of strength and frustration. A boy with a scar shaped like a thunderbolt across one eye. Sting had ordered me to take cover for the time being, and Fro and Lector had joined me in the beginning, before THEY came emerging from between the canopy, hungry for blood.

This sure brought back memories. Back to the old days, as a little girl. My legs screeched as I, swift as a hare, changed direction in the fraction of a second in a failing attempt to shake my pursuers. I felt much like that hare at the moment, though... if my memory served me right, my nickname had been nought of the sort back then. Before it truly became what was etched into my back, I was called...

AT THE GUILD

"And the eyes of the harsh mother softened ever so slightly when the little one was around. The little one was called the White Fox, much like the white flames that usually surrounded her when she got excited about something. For the first time the Dragon Lady seemed content on creating more steady relations with the villagers, and things were looking up. Then the incident happened." Gildarts paused. Looking back at that time, things sure had changed. Natsu was the one to inquire about the incident first, ordering the redheaded male to continuing his tale.

MEANWHILE

Fighting had never been my thing. While I learned to counter hits, neutralising them and deeming them powerless, I was not one to hit back too fiercely.

Aw... shit. Shit shit shit Shit SHIT! River! I jumped, trying ever so desperately to make it to the other side in my shortened flight, but alas...

AT THE GUILD

"Bad blood had grown between some of the people in the village and the fierce lady that came by from time to time. As such they tended to stay clear of her, and her little child. And since they stayed clear, their children were asked to do the same. And stories regarding her past were soon attached to the little girl." Gildarts said seriously.

"So what happened?" Erza asked. This was interesting. Most people knew much of the past of the other members, but other than the fact that Lucy was Northern and had some sort of connection to the Heartfilia family there was little they knew of her childhood.

MEANWHILE

I struggled to keep my head over water in the ever fierce rapids that tried to either drown me or crush me against the rocks. I had managed to relearn how to swim, but swimming through this... and to top it off, my predators still followed on silent pads, running beside the river and waiting for me to emerge from the deadly waters.

AT THE GUILD

"One of the village children tried to kill the White Fox. Since Maya wasn't there, the details aren't all that.. well. I assume she was tricked to come along to play. Being from outside the village and having a mother like that, Lucy was likely alone very often. She had Odin the flying cat to play with, but... anyway. From what I heard Little Lucy was taken outside the village where she was attacked, beat up, and then held down as one of the village children cut in her true name on her back. As if that wasn't enough, they proceeded to tie up her legs, hang her upside down in a tree, and were about to..." he didn't end the sentence, but emphasised his point by dragging a finger across his throat. People stared. The room had already been reasonably quietened that day due to the injuries keeping most brawls to happen, but the atmosphere... it was cooling, as they all thought of the missing Fairy, wherever she might be. The last they had seen of her was at the resort that Loke had given Team Natsu tickets to. Their only memento would be her keys, the keys that had flown through the air close to the Tower of Heaven, right into the paws of Happy.

MEANWHILE

The scream rippled through the air as they jumped my half drowned form, trying to complete the job of ending me. I had never been much of a screamer, never saw the point, but this time I couldn't help it. Even if no one could hear me. No one would help. They never came. Back then, all friendliness was a lie, just like...

AT THE GUILD

"And she snapped. Lucy is very strong. The magic within her has huge potential, but it was mostly dormant up until that point, or at least I thought... She nearly died from the force of her own magic, and was bedridden for over a week. The boy that had tried to kill her after she lost consciousness and gave in to pure survival instinct did not make it. It was soon after that I met her for the first time." he stopped for a moment, and a soft smile appeared as he remembered their first meeting, before he learned the truth.

"You should've seen her. She was the cutest little thing, about yay high and so trusting. And of course, bound for trouble wherever she went. I only stayed for a week while Maya went to take care of what she called personal business, and my little niece took me to see all her favourite spots."

MEANWHILE

My body blazed alight, white and vibrant fires making the beasts scatter, whimpering before growls once more emerged from raging throats. I managed to get up, a bit surprised by my still white flames, thought they long since should have returned to purple, dying and lethal. Then, before the predators could regroup and decide that risking my flames might be worth it, I set off running again, soon with all of them in pursuit. The flames felt hot against my skin, but not in a bad way. Like a long forgotten friend they stuck to my skin, not burning everything away, but rather protecting me, and even following behind, almost like a tail.

AT THE GUILD

"I remember after the Phantom Lord incident. Lucy almost died," Gray commented, a bit muffled since his mouth was part covered by bandages.

"Her eyes turned black, and her skin turned to scales. At least partly." Erza added.

"And she punched that cannon in like it was made of glass, and not steel," Gajeel added with an amused grin.

"Is her magic truly that harmful to her body?" Master asked, remembering the same incident. To be honest he found her affinity to flames to be almost unnatural. Her body embraced it, yet almost seemed to reject it at the same time.

"No." Gildarts said simply.

MEANWHILE

The sparkling blue ahead could be nothing but the sea, and it was starting to dawn on me that I was slowly approaching familiar territory, which was not all that good with my current company. Fighting them all would be impossible though, so I formed a hasty plan B in my head. The violent river I was running next to would be impossible to navigate through, but the ocean. The ocean might yet save me from my current predicament.

AT THE GUILD

"What do you mean, no?" Master questioned, wanting further details.

"Well, I suppose that it is safe to say that her true affinity is Celestial Spirit magic. Because of that, Fire magic should have its risks if used excessively. A person shouldn't really posses too many affinities, though it isn't totally unheard of." Gildarts explained.

"The thing that hurts her body to such a degree, however, isn't the fire magic.." he added.

"Not the fire magic? Then what?" Master asked.

"It is the Pact Maya Clive made with a demon, a Pact made to repress the Fire magic within Lucy. Like I said, when she was little, white flames often lit her up when she was excited. It made her different, and I suppose that Maya merely wanted to make her more normal when she made the pact... it binds the magic to her core. To her veins, her bones, her internal organs. And for a while, it worked. The White fox was suddenly only a small blonde girl stubbing around in town, taken care of like most other children. Until someone tried to kill her." Gildarts darkened. He had gotten to know those final pieces from the Demon sent to kill his niece. Demons were uncanny creatures after all, and that one likely wanted to end the deal with the end of the life of the afflicted.

"Adding to the calamity, the bind, when forced to temporarily stretch in order to be used, extracts more magic that she usually would be capable of using. So it not only wreaks havoc on her body, but drains her magical reserves to the limit. A mage void of magic..." he stopped, was about to continue when... The back door to the guild burst open with great force, letting in a... for a moment she almost looked like an animal, in the middle of a leap and with that great white tail made of vibrant flames. Few even managed to recognise the being due to the bright light, but she clearly recognised the being by the bar, something that momentarily distracted her enough to miss the main door that would have led her to the streets of Magnolia. Before they got to see her through the rising dust, however, a pack, or rather a HORDE of wolves entered through the door she had bursted through a moment before.

MEANWHILE... AT THE GUILD

Things had not gone as planned. I had planned to get into the sea and swim to safety from there. But upon nearing the open waters I had realised the calamity awaiting in those alluring depths. So in the last second, while swearing mentally, I turned and started running by the ocean. And then, suddenly, the guild was nearing.

The familiar building worked against my better judgement, and I had decided to enter through there on my way to elsewhere. The hatred my pursuers held towards me would keep them from scattering in town and attacking villagers, so I felt safe for doing so, but then. By the bar. HIM.

The next I knew, I collided with a wall, and the magical potential of Uncle reached its usual peak as he strongly suggested the pack of wolves to go away without saying a word. Wolves were not stupid enough to go up against the man, so I assumed them to be leaving with urgency. At least the growls turned to whimpers, and they were clearly weakening as the distance between us increased. That, or I might be fainting. The speed I held when I made impact with the stone wall didn't make that impossible.

The warmth of my flames were ceasing, leaving me cold and gasping for air while dust slowly settled around me. It felt lonely without them there.

"Lucy." came the voice of the one that had caused me to collide with the wall in the first place. I stood there, the last remnants of my flames dissipating, staring at the man that stood before me. Red hair. So very very red. I wiped some blood from my face, weary of this new development. What did he want from me? What did Uncle want from me?

"It's been a while." I managed to utter, completely serious, and confused. My brother HAD indeed mentioned something about Uncle being part of this guild, yet... A smile spread across his face, a wide one I had always believed him to be the only one able to produce, before I arrived in Magnolia and met the rest of Fairy Tail.

"You look well, Lucy, though your luck is horrid like always." he commented, and I felt myself blush as I scratched the back of my head. This was not the way this was supposed to transpire. I was not supposed to just waltz into this place, and I was not supposed to come upon my lost relative.

"I suppose. Animals never did like me much. You know that, especially after the.. *ahem*.. incident with the wyverns." I replied sheepishly. He laughed then, a hearty laugh that made me and several others flinch, though no one moved to interrupt the two of us. Why were they so damaged, the lot of them?

"Where have you been? I heard from Master you joined Fairy Tail, but got lost a while back." the man continued. I noted Happy sitting on the counter, clutching what seemed to be my keys. The proximity to them could hardly be good for me. If Loke decided to summon himself...

"Here and there. I met some old acquaintances, and they insisted on..." I trailed off. While "talking" was the word that almost escaped my lips, the word was hardly covering, not even as a half truth.

"And then I met my brother." I added since I found no adequate word.

"And these old acquaintances of yours..?" he stopped too.

"I don't think I'll be seeing them in a while, but we did clear the air, I suppose. And I got to see Milliana again. She has really grown since the last time, and her magic is so STRONG." I mustered my first smile. Milliana. One of the many that wanted me gone.

"You know Milliana?" Erza asked. She had her cuts and bruises too, along with subtle signs of electrocution. It reminded me of the boy my brother was currently fighting. She... didn't know? But.. but... I looked around. Where WAS the contempt? Where was the hate. The rage. The very thing I had been running away from, in a way, though I never had seen myself as one to be running away from anything. I had always been charging ahead regardless of danger, but... There was ONE thing I suddenly realised that I feared more than anything in the whole wide world. More than death. More than the monster that had killed my whole village. More than the dark voice within that sometimes reared its ugly head, telling me that maybe, just maybe, Mama wouldn't come back this time. Yes, even more than that, I feared that these people would hate me.

Slowly I lifted my arms, staring wide eyed at that strange little mark there, pink of colour and seemingly insignificant. And I stared at Erza, suddenly recalling, a memory from my dark well of dark memories. I had seen her before. Little Scarlet, moving around on the working ground at the foot of that wrecked tower. So scared. So fragile. She was blinking under my long stare, confused at the sudden attention.

"You were there too. The little Scarlet Angel. Little Scarlet, fragile Scarlet. You... you were the one he always talked about. You were the one he.. loved." I said, thinking back. Of course. It made sense. In his clearer moments, when the insanity all but ceased for a few moments, she was the one on his mind. She was the final piece that kept him from drowning completely in the darkness that tried to eradicate him completely.

"What are you talking about?" Erza asked, still confused.

"Jellal. Little Jellal. So innocent, and yet so tainted. And he... didn't tell you a thing." I said, making her twinge as if in pain upon hearing the name of the person that once rescued me, and that I even now somewhat regarded a friend. Even with all the pain he had caused me, and the whole dying to have me killed thing. He was not the first, and not the last.

"Tell me?" Erza asked. She didn't know. Of course not, I had been so very different, back then. Back when my bottomless despair temporarily robbed my flames of all light.

"He didn't tell you who I am." I said, and studying my mark again. There was only one way of getting out of this, wasn't there... I tryingly licked my upper teeth, felt their sharpness, and knew that they would do.

"And that's enough." his voice was suddenly very close, and I only noted his clenched face moving towards my face before I acted on instinct. My hand moved to meet his just as my flames returned, vibrant and adding to the strength I knew I needed as his fist collided with mine, the sudden rise yet again of his impressive magical potency moving violently against mine, and the force of his almost strike crushing the ground below us, creating a round crater around us. I still stopped his hit, to the great surprise of pretty much everyone.

"Your skills have improved." he said with a smile, but I just stared at him. I knew that beating him would be impossible. I could barely neutralise enough of his power in order to manage the rest with my own physical strength, and something told me that Uncle could do much much better than this.

"What do you want from me?" I asked instead, trying desperately to come up with some kind of plan in order to get out of this situation.

"I want you to stop considering biting off your guild mark with your bare teeth for one?" he muttered silently, words only meant for me to hear. How did he know?

"And secondly, I want to hug my cute little niece and welcome her home!" he continued, and suddenly I found myself in one of his less nice my-bones-are-just-about-to-snap hugs.

"Can't.. uncle.. can't *gasp* breathe!" I moaned, and could almost hear my bones groaning dangerously from the force.

"You've grown." was the simple remark coming from Uncle while I was caught with not escape. Seeing how I had not seen him in a very long time, I would hope so.

"LUCY!" and a blue cat collided with my back, also hugging me. Where did Happy come from?

"Give the girl some space, boys. Come here, I'll fix you right up." Mirajane interrupted, and Uncle let go of me, though Happy stayed on my shoulder. I lifted my hand, stared at the pink mark that had granted me a family. A home. People I felt that I could trust beyond anything else. Mirajane made her way over, and I heard people yell their welcoming for the lost child. The lost sibling. The lost friend. How did it come to this?

I was a Murderer. A Misfit.

A Monster.

And I should never have friends.

Of course, I knew that retracting our friendship was impossible. I could not claim that I could just rem...

"Lucy?" I stopped my mental ranting when Natsu called my name, a name given by a stranger that at the time had been mourning her child. His battered and heavily bandaged body did not stop him from limping, half crawling his way over to me, catching me in a much less hazardous-for-my-bones hug.

"Welcome home." he said, and I almost stopped breathing.

FLASHBACK

"And welcome home!" she yelled, a small girl with no name, or at least her mother had claimed so. The girl herself claimed to be named Lucy. Brave little girl, daring herself up against Maya Clive, one of the scariest women Gildarts had ever met.

"I don't live here, though." he said, a bit surprised by her grand statement, said in such a happy and determined voice.

"But you do, you know. Since you're family. At least Mama says so, y'know, and families need homes. Many homes. Mama doesn't like it, she says homes aren't important, but..." the little thing stopped talking in order to take a deep breath after her speech. Then she smiled brilliantly.

"But you know, Mama can be wrong too. The old man by the river says so, see, and he's waaaaaay older than Mama. And d'you know what he says? A home is the place where ALL the family can come back and be safe. No matter if they're mad at each other, or hurt, or lost, or sad or anything. So welcome home!" she yelled her welcome again, and he could do nothing but comply.

FLASHBACK END

"Not fair..." I muttered, but gave in to temptation, like I had too many times already when it came to this guild and the people within it.

"Come on, darling, I'll get you patched up. There's a festival tonight, you see, and we need all the help we can get." Mirajane said, gently separating me from my bandaged comrade. Why wasn't I struggling to make my point? And why did I feel so warm inside as I was led away, so warm and content and... home.


	26. Family

My flames... Once upon a time they had been used to light the way before me, a bright and vibrant light that made shadows dance and darkness shy away from me. Therefore it was a shock to the system when I became darkness for the first time. When I noticed that I, upon letting the warmth envelope my hand, made the surroundings darken around me.

That had been the first time I truly feared the dark.

She stared in disbelief, Mirajane, at my back where my name from a lifetime ago still stood etched into my pale flesh. Years, it had been, since those days when I trusted small boys to want nothing but good. Years it had been, since I walked the forests at night, looking for a body my mother in secrecy had burnt, a truth I did not get to know until later.

I felt vulnerable after having her undress me in the guild infirmary, vulnerable since she was one of the few to ever having seen it after I covered it... back then. After being rescued by Mama, rescued from that tower that was no more. I had covered it then, and had hoped never having to expose it like that ever again.

"Come on. You wanted to see if I was alright. I think a wolf got in a good scratch back there, but it'll heal eventually..." I muttered, feeling my face heat up. I sat on the bed, my hands busy covering my "assets" since they were out and all due to the discarded bandages that usually covered my upper upper body, as in above the belly button somewhere.

"A boy did this?" she asked, and I turned my head swiftly, my eyebrows scrunched as I studied the woman. How..?

"How did you know it was a..." I began, but then turned again, hiding my embarrassed face.

"So, what's the verdict? Do I need stitches, or will it be alright if I just cover it with bandages and let it heal?" I asked. I could almost hear her snap back into the now, and felt her hand softly move a hand over the damage done by the canine hunter earlier. Her touch made me cringe for a moment since I was not used to having anyone deal with that particular.. area.

"It needs a few stitches, but don't worry, I've done this plenty of times before." Mira said with a smile in her voice, and I sighed.

"I trust you." I replied silently, and felt the needle against my skin.

"What did you mean when you said that he didn't tell us who you are?" the barmaid asked conversely while moving about, stitching me up with practiced fingers. I felt her starting to make knots, more and more of them before finishing her job, securing the thread. Incidentally, I was so used to the pain there that the stitching up hardly stung at all.

"Do you know Jellal?" I turned when the words of the redhead left her mouth, eyed her protected form that walked towards me, her eyes seeming, hurt. Jellal, the being she was asking about, clearly was someone dear to her. At least was he someone she thought a lot about.

"So he did mention me, did he?" I replied with another question, making her stop in her track for a moment. In the meantime I grabbed hold of my usual bandages and wrapped them around my breasts and upper back, hiding away my shame once more. I felt so much less naked when its twisted letters disappeared under the layers of white fabric.

"Why do you want to know if I know Jellyfish?" I asked when she didn't say anything else.

"Ah. No. Jellal." Mirajane said, as if that was a correction.

"Yes. Jellyfish." I repeated.

"Jellal." Erza repeated.

"Lucy dear, I think you're talking about different things." Mirajane commented.

"Are we?" I asked, looked at the white haired girl that now bowed down in front of me.

"Mhm. Now let me see to that nasty bite on your leg." she said with a smile.

"Sure." I said.

"Can I come in now? Is she decent?" the voice of Uncle sounded from outside the infirmary.

"I'm fine, Uncle." I said, since he sounded slightly worried and since Uncle, like most family members, tended to become slightly unpredictable when their emotions got the better of them.

"A little while longer, Gildarts." Mirajane yelled.

"Oh. Okay..." I could hear him walking down the stairs again, and something randomly breaking in the process, followed by a very familiar "fight me". We all stared at the door for a moment, Erza, Mirajane and I.

"So how come your flames are white now?" Mirajane asked, pushing a sore spot and making blood ooze out, making me cringe and turn back to her. She was staring at a needle, contemplating whether a simple bandage would do the trick or if she needed to stitch me up again. While I secretly hoped for the former, she decided on the latter and brought the pointy thing down to start.

"Lucy..." I stiffened slightly when I recognised the voice of the one I had been waiting for for a while after seeing my keys in my immediate proximity. I knew that he could sense me even without my effort when his key was this close. Loke, the trickster. I remembered briefly when we last met, on that boat after I almost drowned nearby that wrecked tower, and got a bad feeling in my gut. He knew...

FLASHBACK

"Lucy." Loke said. I opened my eyes. How long had I..? The starlit sky marveled above me.

"Hm?" I grunted in my hoarse voice, hoarse because surging seawater wasn't all that good for my sore throat.

"Who is Hope?" he asked.

"A girl I killed" I stated in a dead voice.

FLASHBACK END

Then I had forced him to leave, and tossed my keys away. I stared at the Spirit that had once attempted to erase himself in order to atone for his so called crime, and saw that he had found another to ponder on. Black bags under his eyes told me of his sleepless nights, and the haunted eyes of some regrets that kept him occupied even in his waking hours. Even though he ought to have long since regained his strength after returning to his home world, he looked almost as bad as he was the day I came upon him by the grave of his former master.

I was glad that I still wore the shorts from earlier, though my skull-adorned t-shirt lay beside me on the bed. To be completely honest I thought Aquarius to be the first to appear, along with a tidal wave of fury due to my prolonged absence, not to speak of the fact that I deliberately dropped her keys.

"She wasn't your friend." Loke said, his voice grave and his eyes serious. I stared at him, contemplating what on earth he was talking about, when it dawned... the last conversation we had. Hope. I would have thought that anger against the deed done would have been what made his figure so sleep-deprived looking, but at the moment he was insinuating that she, not I, was to be blamed for that happening so many years ago. Fool. Idiot.

"She was." I simply replied, got up on my feet since Mirajane was done stitching and patching me up. I grabbed hold of my shirt, or my brothers shirt, put it on before looking at the Zodiac Spirit.

"You blamed yourself without even being there, yet you plead for my innocence. Many would call that being a hypocrite." I said, studying his facial expression. He really was a mess.

"What are you two talking about?" Erza asked, stopping the beginning of a reply to my accusation. At least his mouth was open, though no sound escaped. Murder. We were discussing the act of murder.

"If you two are talking about that crazy wench named Hope, I hold with the kitten." another voice commented dryly, and I turned swiftly, only to see that brother of mine enter through the window. This was.. how did he..? There were several meters down to the ground outside.

"You didn't even know Hope!" I said in slight outrage.

"It's strange how you get to know the strangest things with a little persuasion. But if you're back on that track, sis, you saw the Jellyfish again." he continued, jumped down from the window sill, landed softly on the ground.

"What is the thing about the Jellyfish?" Mirajane asked, not at all questioning the entrance of the stranger, though I noticed that Erza unconsciously got a better grip on her sword.

"You were the first one to bring up the subject." I muttered to the armoured girl, and saw another flash of almost annoyance slash anger.

"I said Jellal." she said, and I saw another look of hurt. Both my brother and I turned to her, the silence settling for a moment.

"Isn't that the same?" Sting commented, sounding a bit confused.

"I thought so too..." I agreed.

"Jellal is not a jellyfish. At least.. I don't think so..." I could sense slight doubt in the voice of the silver haired barmaid.

"Ah, so that's what this is about. Not that I care all that much about this little misunderstanding. Where's that little prick?" and I turned to look at my fellow blonde, for a moment imagining what the others would be seeing. A shirtless boy wearing loose trousers, with short blonde hair and a dark look that suggested punishment for his next victim.

"LUCY!" and the next I knew I was tackled to the ground by that very shirtless boy, right before the door to the infirmary flew across the room, crashed through the window and continued on.

"Uncle! You're not very good at containing your strength, as per usual..." Sting said, his breath hot against my forehead since he out of instinct had jumped me when he sensed the potential danger.

"Long time no see, kid." came the reply, and Sting sat up to wave at the redheaded male, not moving off of me since Sting had a really strange fixation that made him not trust many people. So now he sat straddling me, a sleep deprived spirit, a depressed knight, a possibly psychotic barmaid and an insanely strong mage in the room with us. I saw Sting send me a quick glance before his eyes roamed over his possible opponents again. Both of us knew that if he chose this battle, it would not be his victory.

"Who are you?" Erza asked, and he looked her over. Even if Sting was crazy strong in his own way, I assessed that even HE might lose against her.

"Ah, I suppose this need some explaining. This is Sting. He's Lucys brother." Gildarts explained before Sting managed to come up with any decent self introduction.

"You have a brother?" Mirajane asked, seeming surprised.

"Several, actually." Sting said, and I sighed.

"Well, I had several. Bull and Faith are dead, you know." I replied dryly.

"Last time I checked Faith was your sister, and yes, I'm aware that Bull is dead. Jellyfish, however, is not. And the moment I find that lying, son of a whore..." he paused for a slight second, and I used the moment to interfere.

"His Mama is NOT a whore!" I yelled in outrage. The language of the guy...

"...I am going to make him cry, and I won't stop there..." he continued regardless.

"Yes you will." I countered, my eyes narrowing, though my position took all the sting out of my statement.

"Nope. He deserves a good beating after the mess he's gotten himself into..." Sting said.

"Excuse me.." Erza said, and though my gut told me it was a bad idea, she was ignored.

"Technically he was under the influence. Must've been under the influence for years. He didn't even recognise me." I argued with my brother.

"I'm going to beat the influence out of him, and then continue beating it until it cries." Sting said.

"Oi." Erza tried again.

"You do nothing but beating things up these days. Mama always says the violence isn't the answer." I said.

"It has worked for me so far, and someone has to do it. Do you know what the guys with the sledgehammers said? You hardly attacked them. At ALL!" he yelled back.

"I would've killed them if I did!" now I was yelling too.

"OI!" and the third one to rise her voice, Erza Scarlet.

"WHAT!?" Sting and I yelled in unison, finally heeding her calls for attention.

"What are you on about?" Erza asked. Her sword was still half raised, though she clearly had no idea whether or not she would need to use it. The lack of response had made her consider using violence regardless of its need.

"So it is true..." Loke muttered, and I tried sitting up, without much luck, while turning my head to look at him.

"What is?" I asked.

"He's your brother." Loke replied. Well. Well done stating the obvious.

"Of course he is, Uncle already said that." I replied, referring to the guy that still straddled me, and that by the looks of it didn't mind. At all.

"No, not Sting. Jellal." Loke specified. Oh. That.

"Well... yes. What about it?" I asked.

"Jellal is your brother?!" Erza yelled in disbelief.

"He is." I confirmed.

"He's my nephew?!" Gildarts yelled, equally flabbergasted. I thought he would've known that, but the lack of family resemblance might've fooled him for some time. To be honest most of my family members remained distinctly dissimilar. Well, except Mama and I. We were very much alike, look wise.

"You can get off me now, by the way." I commented, since lying on the floor like this was making it a bit difficult to keep a decent conversation with these people. My family. If not in blood, I did see them as that. Had I been any other girl I probably would've been thrilled to be like this. I'd seen the looks Sting got from most girls in Hargeon. Had he been any other boy I might've assaulted him by now, too. As in castrating him.

"What if I don't want to?" he said, turning back to me with one of his signature wide grins, the kind that told me he was either planning to, or really wanted to, do something he knew he wasn't supposed to do.

"I'll make you." I said, his smile only widening at my challenge.

"Both of us know that you can't beat me in a fair fight." he countered, bowed down to look me straight in the eyes. I was aware of that.

"Be that as it may, though, I DO have a job coming up." he added as an afterthought, and actually did get off me, reaching out a hand to help me up.

"You're a workaholic, and a drifter." I said while taking his hand, and he lifted me up by it, only letting me go after my legs had left the ground completely. He had always been strong, that brother of mine, though he, unlike Uncle, had much more control over it. Then again, I was rather sure that Uncle could beat him to a pulp any day, even if he was a wimp compared to Mama.

"It's in the blood, apparently, though I still refuse any blood relation to that woman you call a mother." he said, a slight twitch in his face as he mentioned Mama, as per usual.

"You're too similar for that relation to be a lie. What happened to the guy you met, by the way?" I asked. That guy with the scar.

"Made him cry, or as close to crying as he could get. The runt was a lot tougher than I thought, and if it wasn't for his injuries I might've actually struggled a little." Sting said, matter-of-factly.

"Wait, so Jellal Fernandez is your brother?" Erza asked again.

"I thought we already established this." I said, turning away from that other brother or mine.

"You never said you even had siblings beyond your half sister." Mirajane said.

"You never asked. And besides, I've not met most of them in years. Jellyfish, for example. Before that time not too long ago, I hadn't seen him since Mama came to get me there the last time." I said. It really had been years. Years and years since Mama came to get me from hell, the place that made my flames black, before it oddly enough made them into light again.

"Why do you call him Jellyfish?" Mirajane added.

"It was his original name when I named him. I was three, so... his foster family changed it to Jellal though. They said it was more proper or something." I explained. Not everyone agreed with my name-calling skills, those people included.

"Foster family?" Erza questioned.

"Yes." I confirmed.

"Maya never kept her children for long." Uncle explained.

"I am the last. Mama said herself that I am the last." I said. I remembered that time when Uncle came to visit. She'd called me the last back then. Hadn't been the first time she did that, nor the last.

"So you heard that." Uncle said.

"Up to the point where she suggested to kill me. Not that she ever will. She's not that kind of person." I replied. Mama was on edge that time, so I understood her thinking.

"Maya is many things, and though I never saw her as one to harm her family... she was odd towards the end. That fire was her work." he countered.

"Then why use fire? Why use the one thing that was very unlikely to kill me?" I countered.

"You knew?" he asked. Of course I knew. I wasn't stupid. I just.. didn't like thinking too much about it. Mirajane stared at me then, at my bold words and the suggestion that a mother might ever even think of killing... Well, they were well informed. Uncle had told them, I could see it in their faces. By my side I felt Sting shifting closer, and I felt a tinge of dark rage coming from him.

"Do you think I wouldn't recognise her tricks? Mama is many things. Strong. Caring. Loyal. At times dip shit crazy. Deceptive is not on that list, though she does serve up the occasional excellent lie." I said. If they all knew, anyway, there was no point in hiding it.

"This is one of the many reasons why she never should be responsible for children." Sting said, that rage leaking through his voice.

"Shut up, Sting." I retorted without looking at him.

"She didn't even name us. Lucy did the naming. She named all of the others we know of." he continued regardless.

"And that's another thing, how many are there really? Who is Bull?" Uncle asked.

"Does it matter? He's dead." I replied.

"Crux said your family ties are many, yet unconfirmed." Loke said.

"You talked to Crux?" I asked, turned to the Celestial Spirit. Why would he talk to that old fellow? And him, of all the others he could have been...

"Who's Crux?" Mirajane asked.

"A Celestial Spirit that knows a lot. Jellyfish tried to summon him once." I replied.

"What?" Erza said.

"Well, it's the reason why he has the tattoo in the first place. He dragged something through those gates, but it wasn't a Celestial Spirit. Whatever it was, it tried to take his eye, something it almost managed to do. The tattoo is a spell used to heal it afterwards." I explained, remembering the incident. Finding someone to perform that magic in itself had been difficult. Mages in the North were rare, and most tended to stay clear of most others, for obvious reasons. Fear. Hate. Resentment.

"The way I heard it it smelled your relation due to the whole demon thing." Sting added, and I nodded.

"I heard that too. And yes, I do not know if I have met all my family members." I said, and at the same time added the fact that I did not know if all her relatives were accounted for.

"So how many did you name?" Uncle asked.

"I named Sting, Jellyfish, Faith and Bull. Sting and Jellyfish are the only ones left, and that's because they're strong. We were always the strongest. The Fox, the Dragon and the Saint." I said.

"Dragon?" Loke questioned, obviously not seeing the glaringly obvious reason behind the nickname.

"That's me" Sting smirked, and I hit the back of his head, making him grab for that hand and twist it behind me. I promptly took hold of his legs with mine, managed to get him off his feet, and a stalemate where both refused to call for mercy commenced.

"And you're all siblings?" Erza asked.

"Yes." I said with my teeth clenched, finally giving in and turning to send Sting a glare where he sat behind me, his grip on my arm still firm.

"No." he said, looking at me, yet answering the question from the other male.

"You know we are." I said.

"We're not." he countered, and suddenly he moved in, kissed me lightly on the mouth before moving out of my hitting range too fast for me to get a good slug in on him.

"HEY!" I protested as I got back up on my feet, blushing fiercely to his great pleasure.

"See? We're not siblings. But enough of this. I really need to get to my job. My client's impatient, so. I'll come get you next time, 'kay?" he said, backing up towards the window he had entered through earlier.

"You'll get lost." I said, and he laughed, scratched the back of his head.

"Rogue'll help me out. This lot seems nice enough, so I'll leave you to them." he said, smiling. He reached the window, and climbed so he stood on the sill, ready to leave.

"Sting?" I said. He turned to look at me.

"Hm?" he said, encouraging me to go on.

"Don't make me raise it." I said. He knew as well as I what I was talking about. A grave. A final resting place for those that were no more.

"I won't." he replied, his grin softening, almost getting kind, before he jumped, and was gone.


End file.
